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  Southern Right whale       Right whales are baleen whales. They have a bow shaped lower jaw, and an enormous head, which can measure up to one-third of their total body length.  Right whales live in temperate and cool seas in both hemi spheres. They breathe air at the surface of the water through two blowholes located near the top of the head. Right whales swim slowly, with their mouths open.      They are constantly catching and swallowing their prey- mostly krill, plankton and copepods- right whales were named by whalers who considered them the 'right' whale to hunt because they were a rich source of oil. Right whales have been almost hunted to extinction, especially those in the North Atlantic and North Pacific Oceans. So, it is only right that they are today a protected species, and hunting them is banned by many countries . Key words Baleen whales -  Click here Plankton - Plankton are marine drifters . Scientists classify plankton in several ways, including by size, ty

      Whales and dolphins are both mammals.  They both belong to the order Cetacea.  Cetaceans - and this order includes porpoises too - are marine animals that have descended from land animals.   This can be seen from the fact that the bones in their fins resemble the limbs of land mammals, and they need to come to the surface to breathe.     All cetaceans have stream lined bodies without any protruding parts, allowing the animals to glide through water.  Beneath hairless skin, both dolphins and whale carry a layer of blubber that keeps them warm.  All cetaceans spend their entire lives in oceans and rivers, where they pump their tail flukes to move through the water, while using their flippers for stability.   Dolphins tend to inhabit shallower water nearer the coast, while most baleen whales live in deeper water further out to sea.  However, dolphins are generally smaller than whales.     Dolphins and whales have many similarities, but dolphins are different from whales in manways t