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The blue whale's diet consists almost exclusively of krill. [34] Blue whales capture krill through lunge feeding; they swim towards them at high speeds as they open their mouths up to 80°. [34] [69] They may engulf 220 metric tons (220 long tons; 240 short tons) of water at one time. [73]
Its diet is mainly comprised of krill and small crustaceans, along with the occasional small fish. To feed, a blue whale will swim up towards a shoal of prey as the pleats in its neck allow its ...
In general, blue whale populations migrate between their summer feeding areas near the poles and their winter breeding grounds near the tropics. There is also evidence of year-round residencies, and partial or age/sex-based migration. Blue whales are filter feeders; their diet consists almost exclusively of krill. They are generally solitary or ...
Krill are also used for human consumption in several countries. They are known as okiami (オキアミ) in Japan and as camarones in Spain and the Philippines. In the Philippines, they are also called alamang and are used to make a salty paste called bagoong. Krill are also the main prey of baleen whales, including the blue whale.
Blue whales eat almost 9,000 pounds of krill daily, and when it's their feeding season, they eat up to 40 million krill a day. Treehugger also shared this cool fact, "Blue whales, in fact, are the ...
Image credits: unusuals86 Called lunge feeding, it allows blue whales to consume a large amount of food at a time, providing the nutrients and energy needed to reach such enormous size.
Baleen is a filter-feeding system inside the mouths of baleen whales. To use baleen, the whale first opens its mouth underwater to take in water. The whale then pushes the water out, and animals such as krill are filtered by the baleen and remain as a food source for the whale.
In 2010, researchers found whales carry nutrients from the depths of the ocean back to the surface using a process they called the whale pump. [29] Whales feed at deeper levels in the ocean where krill is found, but return regularly to the surface to breathe. There whales defecate a liquid rich in nitrogen and iron.