There are 15 types of whales that visit Antarctica
.jpg)
Antarctic whales are any whales which are known to reside near Antarctica for at least part of the year. They were heavily hunted and exploited by humans in the past, but they are now protected. Whales come to Antarctic waters due to the abundance of food available to them. here are two natural groups of whales, toothed and baleen. As their name implies, toothed whales have teeth, they mostly eat squid and fish, and take their prey one at a time. Baleen whales have a baleen which is a type of squid. They use it to strain small fish and plankton from the water. Southern Ocean whales are migratory, heading to warmer waters during the Antarctic winter. Calves are born in these more hospitable seas, as they would struggle to survive in polar waters during their first few months. The whales return south in the austral spring, following the receding ice edge, an area of high biological productivity which provides a rich feeding ground.
- Arnoux's beaked whale
- Blue whale
- Dwarf sperm whale
- Fin whale
- Gray's beaked whale
- Humpback whale
- Minke whale
- Antarctic minke whale
- Pygmy right whale
- Pygmy sperm whale
- Sei whale
- Southern bottlenose whale
- Southern right whale
- Sperm whale
- Strap-toothed whale
