Blue Whale

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Blue Whale
Adult Blue Whale from the eastern Pacific Ocean.
Adult Blue Whale from the eastern Pacific Ocean.

Size difference between a Blue Whale and a person.

Size difference between a Blue Whale and a person.
Conservation status
Critically EN (IUCN) [1]
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia
Order: Cetacea
Suborder: Mysticeti
Family: Balaenopteridae
Genus: Balaenoptera
Species: B. musculus
Binomial name
Balaenoptera musculus
(Linnaeus, 1758)
Blue Whale range
Blue Whale range

The Blue Whale (Balaenoptera musculus) is a baleen whale, of the biological order Cetacea.

They can grow to be about 30 meters long. The biggest Blue Whale found was 180 tons and measured 98 feet long but larger specimens have been measured at 115 feet although they have never been weighed. This makes blue whales the largest animals ever to be on Earth, even bigger than the largest dinosaurs. They eat tiny living things, like krill and plankton.

[change] Blue whale diet

The blue whale eats mostly very tiny creatures, like krill.[2] These inch-long, shrimp-like zoo plankton swim in swarms, and blue whales feed heavily on them. In the Antarctic summer, there are so many of these krill that they turn the waters orange. A blue whale can eat eight to ten tons of krill every day.[2] '

[change] References

  1. Cetacean Specialist Group (1996). Balaenoptera musculus. 2006 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. IUCN 2006. Retrieved on 11 May 2006. Has reasons of why this species is endangered
  2. 2.0 2.1 Fulbright, Jeannie K. (2006). Exploring Creation with Zoology 2: Swimming Creatures of the Fifth Day. 1106 Meridian Plaza, Suite 220, Anderson, IN 46016: Apologia Educational Ministries, Inc.. ISBN 1-932012-73-7. 
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Look up Balaenoptera musculus in Wikispecies, a directory of species

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