EnchantedLearning.com ALL ABOUT WHALES!

Whale Glossary

GASTROPOD Gastropods are a class of mollusks that have a sucker-like foot. These soft-bodied invertebrates include the common garden snail and the slug.

GENUS In classification, a genus is a group of related or similar organisms. A genus contains one or more species. A group of similar genera (the plural of genus) forms a family. In the scientific name of an organism, the first name is its genus (for example, people are Homo sapiens - our genus is Homo).

GEOLOGICAL TIME The history of the earth is described in geological time, which is measured in millions of years and billions of years. The divisions used are: eon, era, period, and epoch.

GEOLOGY Geology is the study of the Earth's structure, including rocks.

GEOLOGIST A geologist is a scientist who studies geology.

GIANT SQUID The giant squid (Architeuthis) is the largest squid and the largest invertebrate (animal without a backbone), but it is rarely (if ever) seen since it lives very deep in the oceans. The largest-known Architeuthis was 57 feet (17.5 m) long. Its eyes are as large as basketballs! It has eight arms, two longer feeding tentacles, a beak, a large head, and two large eyes. These soft-bodied cephalopods are fast-moving carnivores that catch prey with their tentacles, then poison it with a bite from beak-like jaws. They move by squirting water through a siphon, a type of jet propulsion. Only dead examples of Architeuthis have been found. Its only enemy is the sperm whale who hunts it deep in the ocean.

GILLS Gills are organs that fish and amphibians use to breathe underwater. Whales do NOT have gills, they have lungs and breathe air.

GONDWANALAND Gondwanaland (also known as Gondwana) was the southern supercontinent formed after Pangaea broke up during the Jurassic period. It included what are now South America, Africa, India, Australia, and Antarctica.

GRAY WHALE The gray whale (Eschrichtius robustus) is a baleen whale that is about 45 feet long and weighs up to 70,000 pounds. They are benthic feeders (bottom feeders). Gray whales migrate from Alaska to the Baja peninsula in winter. They are a protected species.

GULAR POUCH A gular pouch is a throat pouch in the front, forward part of the neck of some animals.

GULPERS Gulpers are filter feeders (baleen whales) that occasionally take large gulps of concentrated food (usually tiny crustaceans and small fish). Food is then pushed into the gullet with the tongue. Humpback whales, Bryde's whales, and fin whales are gulpers.

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