The Humpback Whale :: essays research papers

To look up into the mountains and see the steam rolling from a mountain stream on a cold winters morning is a beautiful sight. However, to look issue over the horizon and see the dust coat spray of salt water coming from the blow of a coarse hump-back run is much more exciting sight and a only lot warmer. I lived in the mountains of Colorado for most of my childhood. The first meter I had the opportunity to see the ocean was on a spend to California, when I was about 15 years old. It was even better than I had dreamed it would be. The different animals in the ocean, the color of the water, and the warm sand in the midst of my toes was probably what led me to come to the islands of Hawaii. When I first saw the hump-back whale I was amazed at their huge size and how they could breach out of the water so gracefully. It is as if they were trying to play or enter off. So when we were asked to choose a favorite animal, I had no line deciding on the hump-back whale.The hump-back whale gets its name from the distinctive hump in front of the dorsal fin and from the way it raises its back high above water before diving. They are a member of the invest Cetacea. This order is of aquatic mammals and the hump-back belongs to the suborder of the Mysticeti. The Mysticeti are the baleen whales which have three families and some(prenominal) species. The family in which the hump-back belongs is the Balaenopteridae, the true fin backed whale. The thing that separates this genus from the other fin-backed whales is the pectoral medallion fins, which grow in lengths of about 5 meters (16.4 feet). This Genus is called Megaptera meaning great(p) wing (Tinker 290). There was a controversy over the species name in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. In 1932, Remington Kellogg finally settled the matter with Megatera Novaeangliae (Cousteau 84). The common English name is the hump-back whale.The hump-back whale lives in some(prenominal) the Atlantic and the P acific oceans. Since we live in the Pacific Ill be discussing the hump-backs of the sum Pacific. They migrate from North to South. In the months of July through September they gather in the Aleutian Islands, Bering Sea or the Chukchi Sea. They head south for the winter.