Here's how blue whales maintain enormous body size
Digital Reporter
Sunday, October 4, 2015, 3:52 PM - Weighing over 180 tonnes and measuring about 30 metres long, the blue whale is the largest animal on Earth. It's no surprise, these marine creatures have big appetites. But how exactly do these whales maintain their enormous body size?
In a study published on Friday in the Science Advances journal, researchers revealed the whales use an efficient foraging strategy to feed.
While the blue whale has been long thought of as indiscriminate grazers that consume copious amounts of tiny krill throughout the day, regardless of how prey is distributed in the ocean, a new study found this is untrue.
Instead, when krill density is high, the marine mammals feed more intensely in order to save oxygen for future dives when prey is less dense.
RELATED: Watch: Blue whale interrupts TV presenter at perfect moment
"The whales are much more actively assessing their environment and taking advantage of prey in ways that were unknown before, to maximize energy gain," Ecologist Ari Friedlaender of Oregon State University's Marine Mammal Institute told Reuters.
Researchers used high-resolution multisensor digital tags and analyzed data from 55 adult blue whales. The maximum depth of foraging dives ranged from 41 to 310 metres, meanwhile, timing of dives ranged from 0.4 to 15.9 minutes.
Blue whales are filter feeders. When approaching krill, the whale will accelerate, open its mouth and suck in vast quantities of prey-laden water that can amount to 130 per cent of its weight. The sea creature uses its tongue and throat muscles to force the water out, as baleen plates in the mouth act as a sieve to keep the prey in.
Blue whales can eat up to 8,000 pounds of krill daily and are considered an endangered species.
Related video: Rare white humpback whale spotted off country's coast
