Near threatened. Least Concern Extinct. Current Population Trend: Unknown. This photo was submitted to Your Shot, our photo community on Instagram. Follow us on Instagram at natgeoyourshot or visit us at natgeo. Share Tweet Email. Go Further. Animals Wild Cities This wild African cat has adapted to life in a big city.
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Paid Content How Hong Kong protects its sea sanctuaries. History Magazine These 3,year-old giants watched over the cemeteries of Sardinia. Magazine How one image captures 21 hours of a volcanic eruption. Science Why it's so hard to treat pain in infants. Where do beluga whales live? The flexible whale The neck vertebrae in beluga whale are not fused as they are in most other whales or dolphins, which gives them much greater flexibility.
Distribution map. Latest beluga whale news. Will we ever see an end to whale and dolphin captures in Russia? Between late summer and November , more than wild-caught beluga whales and Over Estimated , Live up to Hide Dive deeper. Dive deeper. The fate of beluga whales in captivity Belugas have been on display in captivity since , when a number of individuals were captured in Canadian waters and put on display at Barnum's American Museum in New York. A sanctuary for captive beluga whales In June , the Sea Life Trust, in partnership with WDC, created the world's first beluga whale in a natural bay at Heimaey, one of the Westman Islands, located off the southern coast of Iceland.
Find out more about sanctuaries. Hide dive deeper. Beluga whales need your help Beluga whales continue to be hunted and captured. The main threats Captivity - beluga whales are still being caught and displayed in concrete tanks. WDC is working to stop this practice, and working to create sanctuaries; open water homes for ex-captive whales. Pollution - toxic chemicals from plastic , litter and oil spills build up in beluga whales seriously harming their health and their ability to have young.
Noise pollution - beluga whales rely on sound to navigate and communicate. Noise from military sonar, oil and gas drilling and exploration and shipping can disrupt and confuse them and even cause them to strand. You can help save beluga whales. By supporting WDC, you can help belugas to live safe and free. Together, we can: Stop whaling End captivity Create healthy seas. Please help us save beluga whales.
Some even swim far up rivers. Belugas are social, and form groups called pods. Size lbs. This adaptation allows for maneuverability in shallow water to hunt and to escape from predators. Very thick layer of blubber, thick skin, relatively small tail flukes and pectoral flippers, and absence of a dorsal fin are adaptations for life in cold water. It is composed of lipids fats and can change shape when the whale is producing sounds.
The melon focuses and projects echolocation signals through the water. It is unique to toothed whales and not found on baleen whales. Rather than a dorsal fin, which would be prone to injury from ice and heat loss, a beluga has a dorsal ridge. Color: Generally pale gray to pure white as adults, belugas are a light brown-gray color at birth.
Their light coloration is believed to camouflage the animal in snowy, icy surroundings. Areas such as the dorsal ridge, the edges of the pectoral flippers and the edges of the tail flukes may be darker on adult belugas. Size: Average weight and length of an adult ranges between lbs. Average calf birth weight is lbs. The maximum adult weight reported is lbs. Teeth: The beluga whale has homodont, conical teeth. Teeth are not replaced if lost.
Beluga whales can swim backwards, helping them navigate icy waters. Diets of subpopulations are regionally and seasonally influenced. They are opportunistic feeders, and will consume over species of marine and freshwater fish, mollusks, crustaceans, and even zooplankton.
Belugas do not chew. Larger prey may be torn into smaller pieces, but most food is swallowed whole. Feeding Behaviors: Belugas can hunt cooperatively to conserve energy.
Spit and suction behaviors allow belugas to catch benthic seafloor region prey. Range: Found throughout the Arctic with some subarctic populations such as the St. Lawrence and Amur rivers.
From Svalbard, Norway around to the west coast of Greenland. Cook Inlet stock, Ungava Bay stock, St. Lawrence River stock, Bristol Bay stock, etc. Habitat: Belugas can be found in a wide variety of environments, from deep offshore waters to shallow bays and estuaries; even ranging far upriver. Can travel back and forth between fresh and salt water. Sexual maturity: Females — between years of age Males — between years of age Timing: Reproductive cycle is strictly seasonal, though there is slight variability between regions.
Observed in human care, gestation ranges from months. Births occur most often from late spring to early summer: April — July.
Birth: Belugas give birth to one calf at a time. Females give birth every years. An average birth lasts eight hours. Calf: Calves may not successfully nurse until more than a day after birth. Once nursing, belugas nurse about every half hour, though there may be variation from calf to calf.
Calves curl their tongue, similar to humans, which is used as a straw for nursing. When curled a water-tight seal is formed by the scalloped edges around the tongue. A female beluga can lactate produce milk for approximately 2 years following the birth of her calf. One example of this is the Cook Inlet stock: being isolated geographically as well as genetically, the belugas of this subpopulation are particularly vulnerable. Another population, the beluga whales in Bristol Bay, was believed to be approximately 1, to 1, belugas in the year A few exceptions occur in which hunting is not permitted.
Social Units Belugas are gregarious, and often hunt and interact in groups. Some stocks are migratory, and some are not. Pod structures are very fluid, with individuals moving between different pods.
Pods can join to form herds of several hundred animals at a time. Pods often consist of the same sex and age class. Males often travel in tight pods of 10 individuals. Females and their young form pods, with calves sometimes remaining with their mothers for years or more. Females without young tend to form pods.
Older subadults can also be found together. Skin Beluga skin is ten times thicker than dolphin skin and one hundred times thicker than terrestrial mammal skin.
As the calf develops a thick layer of blubber, the skin is shed. Belugas are constantly sloughing their skin, but also experience an annual molt, which is unique among cetaceans. This may be triggered by environmental cues such as temperature and salinity. Belugas have well-developed skin sensitivity which plays an important role in tactile-oriented social behavior. Blubber Below the skin is a thick insulating layer of blubber which is considered unusually thick when compared to other Odontocetes toothed whales.
Typical thickness of blubber is 4 inches 10 cm , but thicknesses of up to Thickness varies seasonally. Vision The beluga whale has good vision below and above the water surface. Oily mucus is secreted that protects the eyes, washes away debris and possibly streamlines the eye as the beluga swims.
Scientists are unsure if the beluga possesses color vision. The eyes do contain both rods and cones; however, there is only one type of cone, and two or more is typically necessary for color vision. Sleep State The beluga engages in unihemispheric slow wave sleep USWS in which one half of its brain is in a sleep state, while the other half maintains visual and auditory awareness of the environment, while allowing it to surface to breathe.
Life Expectancy Estimated life expectancies in wild beluga populations vary from one study to another. The longevity of belugas in human care has yet to be established because the oldest belugas in human care are currently living and are over 40 years of age. Further research and information is still forthcoming.
The maximum observed swim speed of a beluga whale is about 17 mph
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