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Humpback whale - MEGAPTERA NOVAEANGLIAE
Endangered
Class: Animals with Milk Glands (Mammalia)
The Name "Rorqual": "Rorqual" is an old Norse word for "red whale." Rorquals are those whales that have plates of baleen to strain their food from the seas. "Whale" comes from an old English word, derived from an even more ancient word, all of them simply referring to the animal.
Location: All oceans.
Habitat: Aquatic. Deep waters near coasts.
Description: The humpback is gray-black on the back and dark on the underside of the body. The fins are partly white, and the entire body is covered unevenly with bumps. The huge pectoral fins are up to 14 feet long. A good half of the body is covered with about 28 ventral grooves. The mouth contains about 250 to 350 pair of baleen plates. The humpback can reach over 50 feet long, and average 30 tons in weight.
Behavior: This whale is unafraid of ships and is easy to approach, especially when it spends long periods of time playing, with spectacular leaps out of the water. It travels between cold and warm waters in the summer and winter seasons. This is the famous "singing" whale, whose long vocalizations are more elaborate than any other known whale song. It feeds on krill and fishes.
Reproduction: Gestation lasts 12 months and the young whale, 12 to 14 feet long at birth, is weaned about 11 months after birth.
Note: This species is one of those most threatened with extinction (there may be fewer than 10,000 now living). It is protected, but illegal hunting continues, precisely because these whales are so easy to catch.
Go to the Cetacea Page to learn more about the other whale-like animals.
Go to the Index to compare the various Whales found in America Zoo.
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