<h1 class="ql-align-justify" > this article was originally published by Chen Chen said marine animals, and reprinting is strictly prohibited! </h1>
Hello everyone, I am Xiaobian Chenchen, in the last issue we talked about the cute sea lions, they are also very smart, today we will talk about those huge creatures in the ocean: whales!
sperm whale
<h1 class="ql-align-justify" > maker of ambergris: sperm whales</h1>
The world's smaller whales, all toothed cetaceans, are fierce and make a living by tearing: larger whales are almost all baleen whales, which rely on whale whisker filtration in the sea to prey on, and have a more docile temperament. But sperm whales are exceptional and special, large and toothed whales, with 20 to 25 pairs of teeth in the lower jaw, which is the largest and fiercest type of whale in the toothed cetaceans.
Ferocious and majestic whales
Marine biologists have followed sperm whales for a long time to conclude that they are the fiercest and most majestic whales in cetaceans. Mature sperm whales can reach up to 30 meters in length and weigh more than 60 tons. The largest whale on Earth is the blue-breasted, with a body of 33 African elephants. Although the sperm whale is smaller than it, it is also the "giant" of the ocean. If you see it occasionally at sea, it is like a huge, wrinkled log floating on the sea, and only when it is constantly spraying water does it feel like a terrible living thing. But once it dives underwater, it is flexible, elegant, and agile.
Sperm whale diving
The sperm whale has a very strange appearance, its head is very large, occupying the first quarter of its body, like a large "box" that bulges out, containing the finest oil known to mankind. The function of the large amount of whale oil in this "box" is still a mystery. The jaws of the sperm whale are also a mystery. Scientists have seen sperm whales often hold baby whales in their mouths or touch each other with their jaws, as if kissing. Scientists have also seen a sperm whale with a row of scars on its head, apparently bitten by the teeth of the other's jaw during a fight.
Sperm whales have strong teeth, but they are not mainly used for feeding. In the sea near Sri Lanka, when some people saw sperm whales eating large squid, they all swallowed it. Some scientists believe that sperm whales are likely to stun their prey with excessive clicks and then swallow them.
Adult sperm whales forage to a depth that juvenile whales cannot reach. Females usually take turns looking after their children at sea, feeding them until they are two years old and able to forage independently. The juveniles stay in the herd until they are 5 years old, and then the males take their own doors to organize a bachelor's herd. The female whale either joins the company or stays in the "mother's house".
Fully grown male whales spend most of the year wandering around the waters of the north and south poles. Only during the mating season do you stay in the tropics for a few days. Adult females give birth to children in warm water towns and spend their entire lives.
Sperm whales are also interesting to give birth to baby whales. The mother whale turned over, turned her abdomen toward the water, and spewed out a stream of blood and a cloud of black from the genitals, and a few seconds later, a delicate little sperm whale, with a curled tail and curved fins, floated beside its mother, still with an umbilical cord, but bright eyes, sometimes swimming around the vicinity away from its mother.
The favorite food of the sperm whale is a large squid called the king squid. The king squid is also very large, up to 18 meters long, so the sperm whale preying on the king squid is also very troublesome, often after a long period of fighting to successfully prey. In the process of predation, like two giants in everyone, the waves splashed around. After the battle, the sperm whale can have a full meal, but it is also very tired, and it will leave a lot of traces after the battle.
The mystery of the sperm whale "box"
As we have already said, the sperm whale's head competes for the length of four molecules, shaped like a box, and the whale oil stored in it is all. Each whale can extract 10 to 15 barrels of oil, each barrel is 36 gallons. So what is the role of having so much oil on the whale? This is a mysterious question, and the mystery has not yet been solved. Some scientists believe that the whale "fuel tank" is a high-grade nitrogen absorber, which can suck out the lyssolised nitrogen in the whale's blood, thus ensuring that the whale does not die of diving disease when it rises rapidly from 1500 meters of deep water.
Some scientists believe that the "fuel tank" has the performance of an acoustic support: it can transmit sound without loss, and can transform sound waves like a lens. The propagation of the velocity of sound is uniform, but the propagation rate is significantly slower when approaching the center of the frontal boom, because the concentration of liquid oils at that place is relatively maximum. The square of the wax muscle stored in the lower forehead is next to the ear bone, which inevitably leads to the assumption that the mandible may also act as a receiving antenna or waveguide. Other scientists have speculated that the huge frontal fat of sperm whales is an excellent echo detector based on the mechanism of dolphin hearing. But whether this effect is still to be verified.
Precious ambergris
The special ambergris factory is on sperm whales, and this has been confirmed. But how the precious dragon's birthday incense base was formed. The Order remains a mystery.
Ambergris has always been regarded as a treasure, and it is currently not yet synthesized by workers, so it is even more precious. Because it is an indispensable "myo-scent" ingredient in high-grade perfumes. Adding a small amount of ambergris to the perfume will make the aroma soft, long-lasting and wonderful.
Some scientists speculate that the formation of ambergris is related to the sperm whale's love of hunting the king squid. The king squid has more than 10 meters, has a tough jaw and tooth tongue, is not easy to digest, and the intestines are stimulated and secrete special foreign bodies, which is ambergris.
Scientists have found that ambergris is mostly formed in the whale's large intestine, mainly at the bend of the descending colon, which is a black-gray pathological secretion. The small ones are fist-sized, and the largest ones are 60 kilograms. Ambergris has a disgusting odor when it is first removed from the whale's intestines, and after a period of time, it emits a special fragrance.
Dragon's birthday is a treasure, the production is very small, not all sperm whales have, but accidental encounters, so the yield is extremely unstable. It has been recorded to be found off the coast of Africa, the Americas, Japan, India and China, with the Bahamas being the most numerous.
Why whales like to jump
As long as you have encountered whales while sailing at sea, you will always see whales that love to jump. They jump out of the water and fall with a loud roar. According to scientists' measurements, a 30-ton giant whale can jump out of the water for about 6 meters, and if it is lifted by hand, it is indispensable to 500 people. So why do whales jump? In the past, it was generally believed that their jumping was related to predation, entertainment, and escape from predators. Since the 1980s, some marine biologists have come up with new accounts of whale jumping.
American female biologist Earle believes that whales jump more often than usual during the breeding season, such as male whales often jump out during mating, which may show strength to seek mates or challenge other whales.