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Cuvier's Beaked Whale — printable fact sheet
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Cuvier's Beaked Whale
Ziphius cavirostris
Ziphius cavirostris holds the record for the deepest and longest dive ever measured in any mammal: tagged animals off the coast of California and North Carolina have reached nearly 3,000 m and stayed down for over three hours on a single breath. To do that it collapses its lungs…
Did you know?
- Despite being rarely seen, Cuvier's Beaked Whale is the most widely distributed beaked whale in the world.
- Old males often turn pale-headed or nearly white with age and are scored with cookiecutter shark bite marks and tooth rakes. The whale's foraging dives are followed by a long series of shallow recovery dives, and disturbing that recovery period appears to be part of why sonar is so dangerous to it. Because they feed at depths beyond the reach of light, virtually everything known about their diet comes from stomach contents — mostly deep-sea squid beaks. The genus name Ziphius comes from a Greek word for a swordfish, a nod to the sharply tapered head.
What I learned
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