Download The Blue whale(Balaenoptera musculus)

The Blue whale (Balaenoptera musculus)
This marine mammal is the biggiest animals species in the world ever existed. The blue
whales are grown up to size of 33 meters long and 188 tonnes or more in weight. Their
habitat range is all over the oceans in early 20th century. Recently they became extinct
species and their habitat ranges are reduced to North-East pacific, Antartic and indian
oceans. They feed on krills exclusively. Average consumption for adult whales are
3800kg of krills per day. They feed on area that highly concentration of krills and use
filtering mechanism to isolate krills from water for consuming. Their mating season is
late august to end of the winter. Their birth period is once a every two to three years
start of the winter after a gestation period of 10-12 months. Males reach their sexual
maturity by 8-10 years and females do by 5 years. The blue whale do not have any
predator due to their oversized body, power and speed. However they became extinct
species due to over performance of whale hunting(main reason), accident with fishing
gear, ocean noise, and global warming. Since whale hunting is banned there were
increase in population. Global warming is next biggiest threat for the blue whales.
Global warming cause glacier and permafrost melting in rapid rate which created fresh
water in ocean. These create negative influence on food supply(krill population) and
disruption in thermohalin circulation in ocean. Decrease in the blue whale population is
predictable since global warming is unavoible.