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Five curiosities you may not know about the blue whale

Today we recount, in five entertaining trivia items, one of the most impressive animals in the world, and undoubtedly the largest ever to have lived on the surface of planet Earth. We are talking about the blue whale.

This animal is the largest mammal in existence and also holds a number of impressive records for its size and more. Nearly driven to extinction during the 20th century, it was only declared a protected animal by the international community in 1966. 

Today there should be between 5 and 12 thousand specimens in the world, although few people can say they have seen it live, with their own eyes.

Five fun facts you may not know about the blue whale
Today we recount, in five entertaining trivia items, one of the most impressive animals in the world, and undoubtedly the largest ever to have lived on the surface of planet Earth. We are talking about the blue whale. In addition to being the largest mammal in existence, this animal also holds a number of impressive records for its size and more. Nearly driven to extinction during the 20th century, it was only declared a protected animal by the international community in 1966. Today there should be between 5 and 12 thousand specimens in the world, although few people can say they have seen it live, with their own eyes.
The largest mammal on the planet
According to the Guinness World Record 2023, the blue whale has an average length of 25 metres, and an average weight of 160 tonnes. This makes it the largest mammal currently on our planet, and also the largest animal that has ever existed on Earth, if we exclude a few mega dinosaurs for which there is no concrete evidence.
The largest heart and lungs
It is not surprising that this animal has such large internal organs. In 2014, a heart was taken from a minke whale that had washed up on the beach. It weighed an impressive 199.5 kg (like a piano) and was 1.5 metres in size from top to bottom. In addition, this animal also has the largest lungs of all, capable of holding up to 5000 litres of air, which would be enough to inflate 450 balloons with one blow.
The biggest difference between predator and prey
The blue whale feeds on crustaceans, similar to shrimps, called krill, which can be up to 50 millimetres long. Given the size of this animal, the largest of the whales, statistically there are no other animals that eat prey so much smaller, or, indeed, there are no animals (krill) that have predators so much larger than themselves. The minke whale can eat as much as 3,600 kg a day in the summer months.
Slowest heartbeat for a mammal
The blue whale is able to hold its breath underwater for up to an hour. This is also due to the fact that, underwater, this animal slows its heart down to two beats per minute, with a maximum frequency of just 40 beats per minute.
The daily energy requirement
A single bite of krill can provide as many as 457,000 calories, roughly the same as 830 Big Mac hamburgers, the researchers calculated. Curiously, a single bite also generates more than 200 times the energy needed to capture the food.
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