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Rorquals are the largest group of baleen whales, with eleven species in three genera. They include the largest animal that has ever lived, the blue whale . They take their name from a Norwegian word meaning "furrow whale"; all members of the family have a series of longitudinal folds of skin running from below the mouth back to the navel ...
Rorquals (/ ˈ r ɔːr k w əl z /) are the largest group of baleen whales, comprising the family Balaenopteridae, which contains nine extant species in two genera.They include the largest known animal that has ever lived, the blue whale, which can reach 180 tonnes (200 short tons), and the fin whale, which reaches 120 tonnes (130 short tons); even the smallest of the group, the northern minke ...
Unlike toothed whales, baleen whales have small hairs on the top of their head, stretching from the tip of the rostrum to the blowhole, and, in right whales, on the chin. Like other marine mammals, they lack sebaceous and sweat glands. [57] Accessory baleen plates taper off into small hairs. The baleen of baleen whales are keratinous plates.
The largest bird in the fossil record may be the extinct elephant birds (Aepyornithidae) of Madagascar, which were related to the kiwis. Aepyornis exceeded 3 m (9.8 ft) in height and 500 kg (1,100 lb), while Vorombe could reach a similar height and a mass of 732 kg (1,614 lb). [174] The last of the elephant birds became extinct about 300 years ago.
Whales range in size from the 2.6 metres (8.5 ft) and 135 kilograms (298 lb) dwarf sperm whale to the 29.9 metres (98 ft) and 190 tonnes (210 short tons) blue whale, which is the largest known animal that has ever lived. The sperm whale is the largest toothed predator on Earth.
The fin whale (Balaenoptera physalus), also known as the finback whale or common rorqual, is a species of baleen whale and the second-longest cetacean after the blue whale. The biggest individual reportedly measured 26 m (85 ft) in length, with a maximum recorded weight of 77 to 81 tonnes (85 to 89 short tons ; 76 to 80 long tons ).
In this list of birds by common name 11,278 extant and recently extinct (since 1500) bird species are recognised. [1] Species marked with a "†" are extinct.
A basilosaurid was as big as the larger modern whales, with genera like Basilosaurus reaching lengths of up to 60 ft (18 m) long; dorudontines were smaller, with genera like Dorudon reaching about 15 ft (4.6 m) long. The smallest basilosaurid whale is Tutcetus and measures 8.2 ft (2.5 m) long. [34]