"A bluewhale is attacked by a large group of killerwhales, at least 30 individuals.

They sirkel around the large mammal, preventing it from diving.

Its streamlined dark grey body tower the surface of the water, a giant, even compared to the overwhelming numer of killerwhales.

They are surrounding the bluewhale like a swarm of clinging mosquitos, ready to strike out any moment. When they do, the bluewhale is chanceless. It seems as an easy target for the black and white whales, they rip off large chunks of the side of its body, leaving it with lethal wounds. The killerwhales swims off after their feast and the bluewhale sinks down and eventually dies."

It is a horrible sight, but yet it is intriguing, to see the great creature beeing attacked so brutally.

We are used to see the enormous animal beeing killed by ourselves, by man.

Now in this case, the situation is different, we are not the guilty, nature is.

But an overall question that I ask is, what is the real threat to the bluewhale, has the killewhale taken over our role as the most farefull carnivore?

The true bluewhale is the largest animal to ever have lived on earth.

The female is normally larger than the male. Light coloured spots cover the entire dark greyish body. They are found singly or in pairs usually, but larger groups can be seen on feeding grounds.

It can swim up to a speed of 55 km/hour and dive from 10 – 30 minutes.

The gestation period is 12 months, and when the offspring is born it is between 5-7 meters long. Fully grown it measures between 24 and 30 meter and weigh up to 160 tonns. They feed on krill, squids and small crawfish. At about ten years of age it reaches sexually maturaty. The bluewhale can live up to 90 years.

During the summer the bluewhale stays in the polar regions and consume about 3,6 tonns of food per day.A thick layer of lard is to be worn of during winter, which they spend in the tropics. This is where they copulate and get offspring.

For centuries humans have hunted the bluewhale, nearly to extermination. In the early 20^th century it was the ultimate whaling target. Not only was the bluewhale hunted for its meat, but also because of the fact that one whale could give oil to fill 70-120 barrels. The oil was important for the people hunting the whales at the time, it was used in many aspects of industry.

Yet a catch limit was set (based on the oil yield) with equivalent limits for other species, based on their size compared to the bluewhale. This catch limit was called the Bluewhale unit (BWU). One bluewhale equalled to 2 finwhales which equalled to 2,5 humpbackwhales which again equalled to 6 seiwhales. This did not protect the bluewhales and they were hunted to economic extinction by the 1930’s.

In 1965 the bluewhale was protected, provided by the International whaling commision (IWC).

But would this save the bluewhale? To day it is believed to be aproximatly 5000 whales left. Recovery has been slow since 1965 when it became protected. Are humans no longer responsible for the low number of bluewhales?

It is true that killerwhaleattacks occur and therfore make up a threat to the largest animal on earth. Still, there are other factors which I think make humans the biggest threat of all. Pollution, noice pollution, oil spills, dumping of industrial wastes, disturbence from seismic operations, collisions with large vessels and entanglement in fishing gear are some of the many.

I watched the attach by the killerwhales and was horrified. I thought the killewhales were cruel, vicious murderers. Now I find it interresting that this is not the biggest danger to the beautiful enormous animal. It is still humans. We are still the guilty.

And yes, I would say that we are responsible for the low number of bluewhales left. Unfortunatly they are victims of human interference. Hopefully the recovery will continue and we won’t have to bee ashamed of ourselves in the future.