What does cetacean mean?

What does cetacean mean?

: any of an order (Cetacea) of aquatic mostly marine mammals that includes the whales, dolphins, porpoises, and related forms and that have a torpedo-shaped nearly hairless body, paddle-shaped forelimbs but no hind limbs, one or two nares opening externally at the top of the head, and a horizontally flattened tail used …

What causes cetacean strandings?

Fishing, pollution, ship strikes, and more are responsible for many of the injuries (and subsequent deaths) that lead to strandings. Entanglement in fishing lines is the primary human-made cause of death for cetaceans.

What is the difference between a cetacean and a pinniped?

What distinguishes them from other mammals? Modern marine mammals include: Cetacea (whales, dolphins, and porpoises), Sirenia (sea cows and dugongs) and Pinnipedia (seals, sea lions, and walruses). All of these groups share limbs that are modified into flippers, and an overall streamlined body shape.

What are the characteristics of cetacean?

I. General Characteristics

• Fusiform-shaped body.
• Large body size.
• Virtually hairless.
• Blubber.
• No sebaceous glands.
• Tails flattened dorso-ventrally into flukes.
• Forelimbs are modified into flippers.
• Vestigial hindlimbs.

What is a cetacean expert?

Cetologists, or those who practice cetology, seek to understand and explain cetacean evolution, distribution, morphology, behavior, community dynamics, and other topics.

What is the synonym of cetacean?

In this page you can discover 23 synonyms, antonyms, idiomatic expressions, and related words for cetacean, like: porpoise, grampus, cete, narwal, orca, whale, cetaceous, baleen whale toothed whale, cetacean mammal, blower and blackfish.

How do you stop cetacean stranding?

The use of beacons, sonar reflectors, nets, noise generating devices (including ‘pingers’, distress calls and orca sounds) and other creative solutions to help prevent whale strandings have been suggested and considered for many years.

What are the 4 types of pinnipeds?

The pinnipeds are a group of 33 species of aquatic fin-footed mammals composing three families: the true seals (family Phocidae), the fur seals and sea lions (family Otariidae), and the walrus (family Odobenidae). Pinnipeds live only in rich marine environments and a few inland or tropical freshwater systems.

Where are pinnipeds found?

Living pinnipeds mainly inhabit polar and subpolar regions, particularly the North Atlantic, the North Pacific and the Southern Ocean. They are entirely absent from Indomalayan waters. Monk seals and some otariids live in tropical and subtropical waters.

How many cetacean species are there?

90 species
Cetacea is the scientific term for the group of marine mammals that includes whales, dolphins and porpoises. There are over 90 species of cetaceans that inhabit the world’s oceans, lakes and rivers according to the World Cetacean Database (2016).

Why is cetology important?

Beginnings of cetology The goal of this project was to determine whether killer whales were at risk of becoming a threatened species, due to their sole predator: human beings. What began as an insignificant scientific mission revolutionized the world of whale research 35 years later.

How do you become a Cetologist?

A minimum of a bachelor’s degree, and preferably a master’s or doctoral degree in zoology or wildlife biology with a specialization in cetology, gives you the education to work with the two species, explains the Bureau of Labor Statistics, or BLS.

How do you say the word cetacean?

Break ‘cetacean’ down into sounds: [SI] + [TAY] + [SHUHN] – say it out loud and exaggerate the sounds until you can consistently produce them. Record yourself saying ‘cetacean’ in full sentences, then watch yourself and listen.

Who is the largest member of the cetacean family?

Orca whales
Orca whales are the largest member of the dolphin family.

What is live stranding?

A live stranding is a living animal that comes ashore and is unable to return to the sea, occurring in two forms; single strandings and mass strandings.

What symptoms does cetacean morbillivirus cause?

CMV targets the brain and lungs primarily. The most common symptoms are skin lesions, pneumonia, brain infections, and other secondary infections due to a compromised immune system.

What is group stranding?

When a marine mammal is found on shore or in water too shallow for it to survive, it is termed a “stranding”. Some individuals strand by themselves or in groups (called a mass stranding).

How do pinnipeds sleep?

They sleep in water while holding their breath and floating motionlessly at the surface or at depth. They always wake up to initiate movement to surface for breathing.