Humpback whale
Humpback whales are cetaceans, meaning they are a part of a class with many common features. One being they are all streamlined and elongated in the shaping of their body. They lack external hind limbs. But have forelimbs that are modified into flippers. Cetaceans have a dorsal fin that is situated near the center of the back. Their skin is smooth and hairless. Humpbacks also fall into the Baleen whale category. Baleen is a filtration system in the mouth that serves to filter pry from large amounts of seawater. These whales have evolved to take advantage the largest and most abundant source of food in the oceans: small schooling fish. Baleen consists of several hundred plates that hang from the upper jaw in two racks. One on each side of the mouth. The humpbacks gulp a tremendous amount of seawater and prey, pushing the water through the baleen filter; they extract the krill and fish. The baleen is the consistency of our fingernails.
Flippers(pectoral fins) are the paddle-like shaped limbs of a cetacean. A common behavior of the Humpback is sticking his flippers up in the air to help in cooling the whales temperature down. The pec fins are full of blood vessels.
Breaching is when the whales jumps or clears the water’s surface. There still is much debate as to why they do this. With only two pumps of the tail these humpbacks can project their selves completely out of the water. On average, the humpbacks weigh 90,000 pounds. Adult humpbacks reach lengths upwards of 52-56 feet with the males being slightly smaller than the females.
Flukes are the two horizontally flattened, fin like structures that make up a whales tale. The underside of a whale’s tale is their fingerprint. Much like our finger prints tell us apart, the shapes and colorings of the underside of the humpbacks tale tells them apart.
