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The bowhead whale is among the largest baleen whale species and is distinguished by its round body with an exceptionally curved rostrum, a large head, and long, dark baleen plates. Relative to its size, the bowhead whale has the largest head of any cetacean, [11] measuring nearly 40% of the total body length. [12]
Balaena is a genus of cetacean (whale) in the family Balaenidae. Balaena is considered a monotypic genus, as it has only a single extant species, the bowhead whale (B. mysticetus). It was named in 1758 by Linnaeus, who at the time considered all of the right whales (and the bowhead) as a single species.
Marine mammals comprise over 130 living and recently extinct species in three taxonomic orders.The Society for Marine Mammalogy, an international scientific society, maintains a list of valid species and subspecies, most recently updated in October 2015. [1]
The four species of the Balaenidae are found in temperate and polar waters; Eubalaena glacialis (North Atlantic right whale), Eubalaena japonica (North Pacific right whale), Eubalaena australis (southern right whale), and Balaena mysticetus (bowhead whale). Bowhead and right whales can reach up to 18 meters in length and over 100 tons at maturity.
Balaenoptera (from Latin balaena 'whale' and Ancient Greek πτερά (pterá) 'fin') is a genus of rorquals containing eight extant species. [2] Balaenoptera comprises all but two of the extant species in its family (the humpback whale and gray whale); the genus is currently polyphyletic, with the two aforementioned species being phylogenetically nested within it.
Mysticeti comprises the families Balaenidae (right and bowhead whales), Balaenopteridae , Eschrichtiidae (the gray whale) and Cetotheriidae (the pygmy right whale). There are currently 16 species of baleen whales. Baleen whales split from toothed whales (Odontoceti) around 34 million years ago
Baleen whales range in size from the 6 m (20 ft) and 3,000 kg (6,600 lb) pygmy right whale to the 31 m (102 ft) and 190 t (210 short tons) blue whale, the largest known animal to have ever existed. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] They are sexually dimorphic .
[7] The term "Great Whales" covers those currently regulated by the International Whaling Commission: [8] the Odontoceti family Physeteridae (sperm whales); and the Mysticeti families Balaenidae (right and bowhead whales), Eschrichtiidae (grey whales), and some of the Balaenopteridae (Minke, Bryde's, Sei, Blue and Fin; not Eden's and Omura's ...