Introduction
Whales are pretty interesting
because of their unique sizes,
shapes and way of doing things.
Male whales are called bulls,
female whales are called cows
and young whales are called
calves. I hope you enjoy my
report.
Baleen and Toothed Whales
There are two categories of
whales: Baleen and Toothed. They
have many differences. Toothed
whales have teeth, but Baleen
whales have Baleen plates, which
hang down from the roofs of
their mouths. The Toothed whales
have one blowhole and the baleen
whales have two. The largest
whales are baleen.
Some
examples of Baleen whales are
Humpback, Blue and Gray.
Some
examples of toothed whales are
Orcas, Sperm, Narwhal and
Beluga.
Background/Evolution
There are more than 80 types
of whales. Scientists believe
that whales used to be land
animals. They think that whales
would go into the water for food
and very slowly they adapted to
the water. As land animals
whales’ relatives were hippos,
cattle and deer.
Psychical Description
Many kinds of whales have
different features and ways of
doing things. For example, adult
blue whales can grow up to 90
feet long and can weigh up to
148 tons. Baby blue whales are
as big as an adult elephant.
Blue whales spouts are 30 feet
tall (which is taller than this
building). A blue whale’s heart
is about the same size as a
small car. A humpback whale’s
eye is as big as a medium sized
plate and the pupil is as big as
an orange. A humpback’s tail can
be a third of its body. Most
whales have dark tops and light
bottoms. They’re hard to see
from above the water and hard
for prey to see against the
light surface.
Whales use their flippers for
changing direction as they swim.
Their tail is made of all
muscle. The bones inside a
whale’s flipper are very similar
to the bones in a human hand.
Whale’s tails move up and down
unlike a fish whose tail moves
side to side. Whales can’t sleep
for a long time because they
need to get air so they take a
lot of little naps. Snores,
clicks, roars, squeals and
groans make up a whale’s song.
Diet
Baleen whales and toothed
whales eat very different
things. Baleen whales eat little
tiny fish that float through
their baleen plates. Baleen
plates are kind of like curtains
that hang down from the roof of
baleen whales mouths. Humpback
whales eat little five inch long
fish. Blue whales eat three inch
long krill and about 9,000
pounds of plankton per day. With
every gulp of food baleen whales
take in a lot of water. Blue
whales take in 66 tons of water
per gulp! Baleen whales get the
water out of their mouths by
pushing it through their baleen
plates with their huge tongue.
Toothed whales catch their food
in a very different way, by
grabbing it with their teeth.
Even though they have teeth,
toothed whales don’t chew their
food, they swallow it whole.
Toothed whales use a system
called echolocation to catch
prey that are far away. They
make a sound that travels
through the water and hits the
prey and then the sound bounces
back. That helps tham know where
the prey is.
Sperm whales dive
down 3,000 feet to catch giant
squid (3,000 feet is about two
Empire State Buildings stacked
on top of each other!).
Migration
Why do whales migrate?
They
like to be in the Arctic because
it’s easy for them to find lots
of food.
But, while giving
birth they need the water to be
warmer because their calves are
born with less blubber than the
bulls or cows so they can’t
tolerate freezing cold water.
During migration, whales swim
non-stop, they don’t even eat.
The kind of whale that migrates
the longest is the gray whale,
who migrate about 12,500 miles
per year.
That’s like traveling
from San Francisco to New York
four times in a row!
Life Cycle
A lot happens during the six
or seven years it takes for a
whale to go from being a baby to
a parent. It takes ten to twelve
months for a baby to be born.
Baleen whales nurse for six to
eight months. Toothed whales
nurse for up to two years.
Humpback babies stay with their
mom until they’re one year old.
Whale babies learn by watching
their mom. Whales are ready to
breed at six years old. Females
give birth about every two or
three years.
Conclusion
Some whales are endangered. They
are endangered because people used
to hunt them. Hunting whales is now
against the law, but some people
want the law changed. They want to
be able to hunt whales again. Some
lipstick companies use whale
blubber in their lipsticks.
I
hope that whales will never go
extinct and that this report makes
you want to help save the whales.