Dec 21 2007
A Whale of a Big Gulp
This is pretty amazing - and it shows that God makes cool critters. Researchers from UC Berkeley and the University of British Columbia have created a picture of how some whales eat. From this article:
It turns out that a fin whale dives very deep for food. It plunges more than 600 feet below the sea surface, most likely in search of giant swarms of krill. What the whale does next came as a complete surprise to the scientists. “It was still swimming, but it was slowing down really fast,” Mr. Goldbogen said. Even as the whale pumps its powerful tail, it comes to a compete stop in three seconds.
The whale grinds to a halt, the scientists concluded, by opening its mouth. Water floods in, pushing its giant lower jaws back until they hang perpendicularly from its body. Suddenly the whale is producing colossal amounts of drag. “The whales are beautifully streamlined so they can swim fast and efficiently, and then they’re throwing it all out the window,” Mr. Goldbogen said.
In fact, a fin whale’s body turns out to be exquisitely adapted for increasing its drag. The underside of its mouth is made up of a unique set of pleats that can stretch to four times their normal size. By continuing to beat its tail, the whale forces more water in, causing its mouth to expand like a parachute. And just as race car drivers use parachutes to slow them down, the whale’s inflated mouth brings it to a dead stop.
Mr. Goldbogen and his colleagues calculate that in just three seconds, the mouth of a 60-foot fin whale fills with more than 18,000 gallons of water. That’s the same volume as a school bus, and weighs more than the whale itself.
December 22nd, 2007 at 08:18 am
I understand their next test subject is going to be Rosie O’Donnell; they’re expecting all the stats to be pretty similar though.
December 22nd, 2007 at 11:38 am
kingdavid »
Be nice, even to Rosie.