This is the largest creature on Earth that is still alive today

In the wild, the largest creatures on the Earth, turn out are gentle creatures, and not dangerous. Yes, the blue whales or Balaenoptera musculus, the sea creatures are believed to be the biggest living beings who ever lived on the planet, even bigger than the biggest dinosaurs.

The largest blue whale ever recorded weighed 181 tons and a length of 33 meters. If placed on the ground, the blue whale is equal to a length of 9 family cars! And the heart size of the sea mamals is similar to the size of a car, with the blood vessels was big too, so that we could swim in it.

Blue whale (Balaenoptera musculus). (Picture from: http://adf.ly/1ZwX7w)

Imagine if we sail in the ocean for the first time, exploring the places that we have never seen, and suddenly at beside the ship, we saw blue whales come to the surface, and its size turned out to be more length than the ship that we were riding.

Maybe we will be afraid, especially perhaps because we have never seen a living creature with a size so large, we also do not know, what this giant sea creatures could do, whether it can flip over the ship and feed on humans. In fact, we need not fear with this giant sea creature.

The size comparison of some whale species. (Picture from: http://adf.ly/1ZwXzs)

The staple food of blue whales is krill, though they also eat copepods in small quantities. Zooplankton species is eaten by various blue whales from one ocean to another. In the North Atlantic, Meganyctiphanes norvegica, Thysanoessa raschii, Thysanoessa inermis and Thysanoessa longicaudata were their common foods. While in the South Pacific, Euphausia pacifica, Thysanoessa inermis, Thysanoessa longipes, Thysanoessa spinifera, Nyctiphanes simplex dan Nematoscelis megalops. And in the Antarctic, they ate  Euphausia superba, Euphausia crystallorophias dan Euphausia vallentini.

An adult blue whale can eat up as much as 40 million krill per day. They always ate in areas with high concentrations of krill, so sometimes it takes approximately 3,600 kilograms (7,900 lbs) of krill in a single day. Blue whales filling their bellies in waters rich in krill in the Antarctic before migrating to breeding grounds in warmer waters and less rich in krill near the equator.

Perhaps one of the most spectacular of the blue whales are the sounds they make. Researchers have measured the low-frequency sounds produced by blue whales to communicate with each other using the decible-meter devices.

Some of their vocalizations have been recorded as loud as 188 decibels and can be heard as far as 848 km! Wow, just for comparison, the sound of jet aircraft that was taking off is 120 decibels. Thus, we can conclude that the blue whale is a living creature that is able to produce the loudest sound in the world.

Why the Blue Whale can be sized so big? So far, researchers still are not sure why, but they believe with certainty that any of the dinosaurs in the past, they never reached the size of a blue whale. This is the greatest living creature that has ever lived on the Earth, and is still alive today.

One important reason why whales can reach large sizes is that they have a large living space, a large area to move around and explore. Because more than 70% of the Earth is water.

Now, we get to know that the blue whales are completely harmless to humans, and in fact, they have something in common with the human, that they are the warm-blooded mammals who must breathe with the air.

They are also social animals with complex language and intelligence. And most importantly, the blue whales are not a monster at all, they are a gentle giant that we must respect, admire, and protect. *** [EKA | FROM VARIOUS SOURCES | NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC INDONESIA]

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