Lead
"The blue whale can pull out more than 2 tons of thin feces in a single bowel movement, and it is also disposable, just like a flood opening the floodgates, and all the surrounding fish are 'pooping to the head'."
This is the wail of a whale who has been greatly wronged, and it makes people laugh, but why is it that the defecation of blue whales is indeed so powerful, and their defecation is called "nature's gift".
1. How strong is the blue whale's bowel movements?
The blue whale is the largest animal ever built on earth, its size is terrible, the weight of a blue whale can reach more than 160 tons, equivalent to the weight of 100 large trucks, the body length is 33 meters, and it is as tall as a 3-story building, but the blue whale is not very fierce because of its huge size, on the contrary, the blue whale is one of the most docile animals in the world.
It has a gentle personality and mainly feeds on small fish and shrimp, so it is often said that the blue whale is a "big stomach".
Blue whales generally have to eat 2 tons of food every day to survive, and its diet is mainly some bottom organisms, such as krill, crustaceans, etc., and these small creatures are only one or two centimeters in size, but they are used as a delicacy by blue whales, and they are devoured into their stomachs.
If the blue whale wants to devour these small creatures, it needs to use tiny baleen to form a huge food storage bag with half the length of the whale's tongue, and then the whale will open its big mouth and swallow those small creatures, and finally form a one-time "gluttonous meal".
However, the whale's stomach is not as large as its size, and when the food enters the whale's stomach, it will be digested quickly, so the blue whale will pull out more than 2 tons of loose feces every time it defecates, and these feces are gifts from marine life.
2. What is the function of blue whale feces?
The defecation of blue whales is vital to marine ecosystems, as their feces contain a large amount of nutrients that provide nourishment for the bottom organisms in the ocean.
When the blue whale defecates, the surrounding marine creatures will be sprayed by the defecation, and these marine creatures will be attracted by the feces of this "gift" and rush to be "spectators".
In particular, some demersal organisms, such as krill, are small transparent shrimp species that are particularly fond of eating the feces of blue whales, forming an ecological closed loop.
After krill eats the feces of blue whales, they will "decompose" the organic matter in the feces, so that the feces of blue whales will be broken down into small grains, which are easier to be swallowed by other fish, and krill will also be stuffed because of eating the feces of blue whales, and then eaten by other small fish, and then eaten by large fish through small fish, and finally form a food chain.
This food chain is also often referred to as "upper organisms eat lower organisms", and the feces of blue whales are a way to maintain the balance of the food chain.
In addition to krill, there is another marine creature that blue whale feces will particularly like to eat, that is, microplankton, which is a kind of bensal organism like krill, and they also have a "special feeling" for blue whale feces.
This microscopic plankton produces large amounts of ammonia nitrogen in whale feces, which is a nitrogenous organic compound that is rich in nutrients and is a great plant to provide nutrients.
Microscopic plankton produce large amounts of ammonia nitrogen in the droppings of blue whales, which are then blown to the surface of the ocean and then gradually sink to the bottom of the water, eventually providing nutrients for the large plankton on the surface of the ocean, which means that the droppings of blue whales can also provide nutrients for marine plankton.
3. What is a whale fall?
Some people may wonder if the feces of blue whales have drifted to the surface of the ocean, so how do creatures in the deep sea eat them?
After the feces of the blue whale drift to the surface of the ocean, it will be attracted to various marine life, and then eaten by various sea creatures, eventually forming a food chain.
That's why it's often said that the blue whale is the "fixture of the ocean" and that it feeds the creatures of the ocean every day.
Also known as the "engineer of marine animals", the blue whale also provides food for marine life after its death in addition to defecation.
After the whale dies, it generally sinks to the bottom of the sea, and there is a landscape in the deep sea, which is called "whale fall".
It is often said that whale falls are the last tenderness of the blue whale, and whale falls are actually a food resource for deep-sea creatures.
Whale falls can survive in the deep sea for hundreds of years, and because the water temperature in the deep sea is relatively cold, whale falls are not so perishable, and its decay period can reach up to hundreds of years.
When the whale falls and decays, it produces a large amount of nutrients, which provides abundant nutrients for the growth of coral reefs, and at the same time, it also provides abundant food resources for creatures in the deep sea.
4. What is the current situation of the blue whale?
Blue whales are a species threatened by commercial killing and marine litter, and the reason why they are killed commercially is because of the whale oil and shark fins on their bodies, which are very valuable commodities, and the shark fins of blue whales are also a very popular seafood delicacy.
In addition, marine debris is also a threat to blue whales, there is a lot of plastic garbage in the ocean, and blue whales will hang up because of eating these plastic garbage by mistake, so the survival status of blue whales is not optimistic.
In addition, in some places, blue whales will also be stranded due to commercial fishing, stranded blue whales are easy to die, and after the stranded blue whales die, it will also have a devastating impact on marine ecology.
For example, on the island of Gutterlang in Australia, more than 500 blue whales have been stranded, which has led to the beaches of Gutterlang Island littered with decomposing blue whale carcasses, which can also breed maggots and eventually lead to beach pollution.
Human activities are a threat to blue whales, so people should strengthen protection measures for blue whales to avoid irreversible damage to marine ecosystems.
epilogue
In nature, even excrement has an important ecological role, providing nutrients for benthic organisms and maintaining the balance of the food chain.
As the last tenderness of the whale, the whale fall shows the cycle and continuation of life, and also provides a precious food resource for deep-sea creatures.