my care2
make a difference

community & fun

groups

get together & make a difference

 
 
 Whales August 05, 2006 3:28 PM

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ whales ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Feel free to post any general info on whales here.

 [ send green star]
 
why sperm whales are out of this world... August 09, 2006 4:30 PM

they just amaze me more and more every day and here are some of the reasons why... males and females live thousands of kilometers apart, in a totally different way of life, an amazing evolutioary trait. they are born in warm tropical waters, and a newborn is about 4 m longg. They suckle milk for FIVE years, then male babyspermwhales form a teenager groups that go towards polar waters. They get bigger and the groups get smaller, an eventually they end up here in the polar circle (some go down in the southern hemisphere too)and by this time they are about 12 meters long, getting bigger every day, eating a TONof fish and suid a day. They find the prey by echolocation, which works quite similar to a sonar, but is more precise than all human - made sophisticated equipement. A huge organ they have in the head filled with to 5 000 liters of oil, spermaceti organ, plays a key role in ecolocation sond production. Males grow to be 20 meters long and weigh up to 50 tons, females 11 meters long and up to 20 tons. One f the most amazing intersexual differences in the mammal world. At this point half a world is separating them from the place where they were born and where the females are, now hey can dive down to depths of 3000 m (remember they only can take one deep breath for the wole dive, just like us..but the best human divers still end their record dives at about 180 m) and hold their breath up to 2 hours and 18 minutes (that´s as much as we´re sure of so far!) Males live to eat and eat to get big and reproduce some fine day, logging at the surface just to get some air and get back in the deep to feed. They don´t care much about other males, communication and social bonding. On the surface they seem to be pretty much out of their natural habitat, the deep see, which they return to as soon as possible. But some day the males go back, making a really long swim from Northern Norway and similar areas around the world to the warm place where they were born, could be the Mediterranean, Azores or Canary islands, to wonder between female groups and mate with them. Meanwhile, females have been raised in a group, with strong social bonds, lots of communication going on between them at all times as well as physical closeness on the suface and when they´re diving. they have a babysitting system when deep diving moms can´t be followed by the babies. They are often seeen logging, cuddling, playing and milling at the suface. wierd creatures. try to know them..their world is quite amazing  [ send green star]
 
 August 09, 2006 4:45 PM

>>>why sperm whales are out of this world... they just amaze me more and more every day and here are some of the reasons why...

Thanks for posting that, Iva! They truly are! I think blue whales and and the whale shark (the world's biggest fish - a shark that eats plankton) are definately the most amazing of all sea creatures.

Definately makes you put life in perspective.

Holly

 [ send green star]
 
 August 10, 2006 10:02 AM

thought I might as well post this...

Two of the several things I want to do before I die is swim with dolphins and swim with a whale shark. I think it would be so much fun.

 [ send green star]
 
  New Topic              Back To Topics Read Code of Conduct

 

This group:
Marine Animal Zone
187 Members

View All Topics
New Topic

Track Topic
Mail Preferences


Copyright © 2009 Care2.com, inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved