Balaenoptera

About Balaenoptera

Balaenoptera holds the extremes of body size in the animal kingdom. The blue whale and the fin whale are the two largest animals known to have existed; the minke whales at the other end of the genus are barely a third of the fin whale’s length. All share the pleated throat, the far-set falcate dorsal fin and the long, flat rostrum of a lunge feeder, and several carry asymmetric head pigmentation — the fin whale’s white right lower jaw and dark left being the best-known example, thought to relate to how it circles prey.

The genus is among the most actively revised in cetacean taxonomy. Omura’s whale was recognised as distinct in 2003, the Bryde’s whale complex has been repeatedly split, and Rice’s whale was described in 2021 from a resident Gulf of Mexico population that had been assumed to be Bryde’s whales. Fertile hybrids between blue and fin whales have been confirmed genetically, which complicates the picture further.