Bai Kejun recently paid attention to a news - recently, the "2020 South China Sea Deep Diving and Far Sea Cetacean Expedition Voyage" organized by the Marine Mammals and Marine Bioacoustics Research Laboratory of the Institute of Deep-sea Sciences and Engineering of the Chinese Academy of Sciences completed all the scientific expedition tasks and successfully returned to Sanya.
From the name of this expedition, it is not difficult to find that scientists are running to watch whales. "Whale watching" is the signature punch card program of several seaside resorts today. Visitors are excited to see a giant whale or a flock of lively dolphins for half a day.
During this expedition, they "encountered" 11 species of cetaceans, including 7 species of deep-diving cetaceans, namely sperm whales, Kesper's beaked whales, short-limbed pilot whales, Reed's dolphins, pseudo-killer whales, small killer whales and melon head whales; other distant sea cetaceans, namely tropical spotted dolphins, Freund's dolphins, long-snouted flying dolphins and striped dolphins.
What do these cetaceans look like? The homepage is one by one for everyone to see.
#抹香鲸 #
Sperm whales are the largest toothed whales in the world. Toothed whales are one of the two major evolutionary chronicles of cetaceans, and the other is filter-feeding baleen whales, such as blue whales. Sperm whales are the most common type of large whales in modern whaling activities. American writer Melville's classic "Moby Dick", in which the big whale that the captain wants to hunt is a white sperm whale. Sperm whales are widely distributed in ice-free waters around the world and can be found from the equator to the poles.
There's an interesting phenomenon about them: when sperm whales sleep, they float vertically near the surface of the water, like a large upright log.
#柯氏喙鲸 #
The Beaked Whale is one of the most widely distributed species of beaked whales. The beaked whale family, also known as the sword-kissed whale family, is the most mysterious family of cetaceans. As the name suggests, they have a prominent beak in this category of whales, and the beaked whale family contains more than 20 species of whales in 6 genera.
Scientists think it is very rare to observe Ke's beaked whales in this South China Sea expedition, because beaked whales are "heavy divers", which is really not easy to be observed. The Beaked Whale is quite stout and cigar-shaped. Because their snouts are shorter than those of other beaked whales, and their foreheads are slightly spherical and protruding, they are also known as goosebill whales.
Dr. Lin Wenzhi, an associate researcher in the Laboratory of Marine Mammals and Marine Biological Acoustics of the Institute of Deep Seas of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, almost mistakenly thought it was a brown-yellow woven bag when he saw the Ke's beaked whale!
ps: The map of the Ke's beaked whale is really much less than that of the sperm whale, so it is not easy for people to observe them!
#短肢领航鲸 #
Short-limbed pilot whale photographed by scientists during this expedition voyage
Although called whales, short-limbed pilot whales belong to the dolphin family! There is only one of their closest relatives, the long-limbed pilot whale (both short and long), and the two pilot whales are very similar in appearance, both with rounded and stocky foreheads, gray-black backs and gray-white abdomen. Pilot whales often follow the ships in the sea, constantly jumping on both sides of the bow, leading the way——— which is also the origin of the name "pilot whale".
From the above figure, we can see that there are still subtle differences. Short-limbed pilot whales are noticeably shorter with shorter pectoral fins and rounder sides. They also have fewer teeth.
Short-limbed pilot whale photographed by Chinese scientists
Short-limbed pilot whales prefer to live in groups, although they are dolphins, but behave more like whales, rarely jumping to hit the waves, but often cetacean tails hit the waves and peep. In this scientific expedition, Chinese scientists also observed the mixed swimming of short-limbed pilot whales and Freud's dolphins, which is a bit interesting
Nearby are Freund's dolphins, and in the distance are the short-limbed pilot whales
#里氏海豚 #
Risso's dolphin, also known as grey dolphin, Li's dolphin, Ray's dolphin, pattern dolphin, flower whale. They are distributed in the seas of the world, and they are particularly fond of the water depths at the edge of the steep slopes of the continental shelf.
They are grayish-white in color and covered in stripes or rings. These patterns are not born, but traces left by the "competition" with the same kind and squid in the perennial marine life. They have a rounded and blunt snout and a distinct indentation on the forehead, which is their distinguishing feature.
Males can be up to three meters long and weigh up to 500 kilograms, and because they belong to the dolphin family and have "dolphins" in their names, they can be considered the "largest dolphins".
#伪虎鲸 #
What is a pseudo-killer whale? Animals pretending to be killer whales? Hahahahaha, they are also called pseudo-killer whales, quasi-orcas, and are the only living species in the genus Pseudo-killer whales of the dolphin family.
Unlike killer whales, they have a black or dark gray body color and an S-shaped curvature of their pectoral fins, which is one of their distinguishing features.
The original name of the pseudo-killer whale comes from a skull, and the characteristics are similar to the skull of the killer whale, hence the name "pseudo-killer whale".
#小虎鲸 #
Killer Whale: "Am I so famous that everyone wants to touch porcelain?" ”
The baby killer whale is really not a baby killer whale, but a species of small killer whale in the family Dolphinidae, also known as pygmy killer whale and small orca. They resemble killer whales, but are much smaller than killer whales, with adult bodies about 2.2-2.4 meters long, while killer whales are born with almost as much body length, reaching more than 9 meters in adulthood.
The overall body color of the baby killer whale is dark gray to black gray, and the color of the head is darker, especially the color of the head. Adult individuals have white lip lines and white abdomen, and there are really "touching porcelain" killer whales! They are also a very difficult population to observe, so there are very few pictures of them.
#瓜头鲸 #
Melon-headed whales, which don't sound very clever, are named "melon-headed whales" because they have a pointed melon-shaped head. Their slender, mine-shaped bodies have long, pointed pectoral fins, which are about one-fifth the length of their bodies compared to short-limbed pilot whales, which is indeed much longer.
Melon head whales and small killer whales are easily confused and look very similar - the size is comparable, the overall body shape is equal; the small killer whales have a white lip line, their lips are also gray-white, the baby killer whale abdomen is white, and their abdomen also has irregular gray-white markings, which are easy to confuse when viewed on the sea surface.
The difference is that the pectoral fin of the melon-headed whale is pointed, while the end of the pectoral fin of the baby killer whale is rounded and blunt.
#热带斑海豚 #
Also known as the white spotted dolphin, spotted dolphin, white spotted proto-dolphin, is a species of snouted dolphin that lives in tropical to temperate waters around the world. They range in length from 1.6-2.5 meters, the back is dark gray, there is a gray-white "cape" on the side of the body, the most significant feature is the spots on the body - the adult tropical spotted dolphin has a white tip of the snout, the body is covered with spots, with age or even melt into a patchy spot, some elderly spotted dolphins have so many spots that they can't even see the undertone.
Tropical spotted dolphins are social animals, they are very lively, like to play with cruise ships, very cute, is the second largest dolphin in the world after bottlenose dolphins.
However, the abundance of populations also makes them the first choice for human fishing T_T
#弗氏海豚 #
It is the only species of dolphin in the dolphin family, the English name Fraser's dolphin, named in honor of cetacean florinthian Francis Fraser who confirmed that they are independent species. Since the specimen of Freud's dolphin was first discovered in 1895 on the beaches of Sarawak, Malaysia, it is also called sarawak dolphin.
The Dolphins of Freudenberg photographed during this expedition
They range in length from 2.1 to 2.7 meters, with a "fat" body, gray back, white belly, and a slight pink color on the flanks, which is very pleasing in color.
Adult males have black-gray bands that extend from the eyes to the caudal end, while females do not. They often swim with short-limbed pilot whales, melon head whales, zebra dolphins, etc., and their personalities are also very lively and gentle.
#长吻飞旋海豚 #
It's cool to hear the name, right?! The name has "flying spins" because they are really good at "acrobatics"!
The long-snouted flying dolphin, also known as the long-snouted proto-dolphin, is an animal in the genus Protoptoptera in the dolphin family. As the name suggests, "long kiss" and "flying" are their "business cards" - the long-snouted original dolphin is slender, the beak is long and thin, and the entire forehead bulge is not high, giving people a slender and long feeling. They are particularly good at jumping out of the water to perform "acrobatics", the whole body can jump out of the water 1 to 2 meters high, and after jumping out of the water, they can also use the head-tail connection as the axis, turn the body in the air N°, and properly "rotate and jump and close the eyes". Take a look at the gorgeous spins in this video.
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The long-snouted spinner dolphins are lively and not afraid of boats, often frolicking near the boats, and people can see them in subtropical and tropical seas.
#条纹海豚 #
Striped dolphins, this stripe is obvious ~ they are a species of the genus Protoptera in the dolphin family, which is widely distributed and can be seen in the open shallow waters of the world's temperate, subtropical to tropical regions. Their posture is similar to that of tropical spotted dolphins, but because of the special pattern, they can be identified at a glance.
Striped dolphins often appear in large flocks, and sometimes, even up to thousands of them parade together, which is very spectacular.
Introduced here, everyone is not able to distinguish who is who ~ this scientific expedition team can observe so many kinds of cetaceans, it is not easy, the successful completion of this scientific expedition, once again proved that our country's land is vast, proved the richness of our marine resources and species diversity, this is worthy of our pride and pride.
As cetaceans are also flagship animals and indicative organisms of marine ecosystems, research and conservation efforts on them have received great attention in the international community, especially in developed countries. Dr. Lin Wenzhi told everyone in an interview that although the habitat environment of cetaceans is more special and the public rarely sees them in daily life, it does not mean that they are far away from us, "We live in the same earth biosphere, protecting cetaceans or protecting the ecological environment is to protect human beings themselves." ”
Wen 丨 searched for encyclopedia Jun
According to Xinhua News Agency, Nanhai Net, Wikipedia
Picture 丨 Wikipedia, Tetiaroa society