Welcome to the Cetacean Zone!
The purpose of the Cetacean Zone is to provide, education, facts, information and news concerning whales, dolphins and porpoises.
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Introducing Cetaceans
Cetaceans are marine mammals that include whales, dolphins, and porpoises. Modern cetaceans live all their lives in water but being mammals, as are humans, they once lived on the land. Like humans they are mammals and as such are warm blooded and give birth to live young and like humans they also nurse and nurture their young. They also have to breathe air like humans through lungs and they have traces of hair or fur on their bodies.
Whales, dolphins and porpoise are collectively known as cetaceans. Generally speaking whales are the largest of the group, dolphins are the second largest and porpoises are the smallest. Confusingly, there is no scientific reason why cetaceans should be split into three groups and in some cases it can be misleading. For example, there are some whales that are smaller than the largest dolphins and some dolphins that are smaller than the biggest porpoises.
Two Groups of Cetaceans
There are two groups that are used to classify cetaceans: odontocetes, which are toothed whales and mysticetes, which are baleen whales. Toothed whales have only one blow hole while baleens have two. Baleen whales do not have teeth, but have many rows of baleen plates in their mouths instead. As can be expected from their name toothed whales are so named because they have teeth.
Cetaceans are marine mammals that include whales, dolphins, and porpoises. Modern cetaceans live all their lives in water but being mammals, as are humans, they once lived on the land. Like humans they are mammals and as such are warm blooded and give birth to live young and like humans they also nurse and nurture their young. They also have to breathe air like humans through lungs and they have traces of hair or fur on their bodies.
Whales, dolphins and porpoise are collectively known as cetaceans. Generally speaking whales are the largest of the group, dolphins are the second largest and porpoises are the smallest. Confusingly, there is no scientific reason why cetaceans should be split into three groups and in some cases it can be misleading. For example, there are some whales that are smaller than the largest dolphins and some dolphins that are smaller than the biggest porpoises.
Two Groups of Cetaceans
There are two groups that are used to classify cetaceans: odontocetes, which are toothed whales and mysticetes, which are baleen whales. Toothed whales have only one blow hole while baleens have two. Baleen whales do not have teeth, but have many rows of baleen plates in their mouths instead. As can be expected from their name toothed whales are so named because they have teeth.