Baird’s Beaked Whale Weighs as Much as a School Bus Yet Hunts Invisible Prey in Total Darkness

This 12-ton predator hunts prey it cannot see in absolute darkness.

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The deep ocean below 1,000 meters is known as the midnight zone because sunlight never reaches it.

Baird’s beaked whale can weigh up to 12 metric tons and reach lengths over 11 meters, yet it hunts thousands of meters below the surface where sunlight never reaches. It relies on powerful echolocation clicks to detect squid and deep-sea fish in total darkness.

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Despite its immense size, this whale navigates and captures small, agile prey using sound waves rather than vision. The echolocation pulses bounce off soft-bodied squid in an environment that would be visually indistinguishable from empty space.

Its biosonar system is so precise that it can differentiate prey types in the abyss, contributing to our understanding of acoustic navigation and influencing the design of advanced underwater sonar systems.

Source

National Geographic

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