Sperm Whale Research Paper
The species I am writing about is the Sperm Whale (Physeter macrocephalus).[] The Sperm Whale can be found in the ocean but lives from the surface of the water to about 3200m deep.[] This means that the Sperm Whale can go to and fro between the Epipelagic Zone (0m to 200m), the Mesopelagic Zone (200m to 1000m), and the Bathypelagic Zone (1000m to 4000m).[] In the Bathypelagic Zone the Sperm Whale must adapt to many extreme conditions. These extreme conditions are low temperature (4°C), high pressure (5850 psi), no light, and no breathable oxygen.[][] These conditions make it hard to feed, reproduce, and protect against predators, which makes the deep ocean an extreme environment to live in. The Sperm Whale has adapted to these extreme conditions
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The reason it is so cold in the Bathypelagic Zone is because it is so deep in the ocean that light from the sun cannot illuminate the water, lead alone warm it. This could seriously effect survival for the Sperm Whale as they would be too cold to mate, protect against predators, and to even find food. However, the Sperm Whale has adapted to the cold so much so that if they were on land they would die from the amount of heat they produce.[] The Sperm Whale has adapted to using layers of blubber to maintain heat and avoid dying of hyperthermia.[] In fact the Sperm Whale stores so much blubber to fight of the cold that it must eat up to 3% of its own body weight in one day to only maintain blubber supplies.[] This adaptation is what makes hunting its primary prey Giant Squid so much easier. This is because the Sperm Whale can now travel down deep all the way to where the Giant Squid live to hunt. The Sperm Whale is not the only species that uses layers of blubber to stay warm however. Seals, Sea Lions, Polar Bears, and even other species of Whale use layers of blubber to fight off the extreme cold of the environments they live in.[] Without the layers of blubber the Sperm Whale would be forced to stay very close to the surface of the ocean to avoid hyperthermia. This would make any effort to hunt useless as the Sperm Whale would be unable to find any prey large enough to supply it with enough energy. Without blubber the Sperm Whale would be forced to rely on prey inferior in mass and harder to catch than the Giant Squid to
The reason it is so cold in the Bathypelagic Zone is because it is so deep in the ocean that light from the sun cannot illuminate the water, lead alone warm it. This could seriously effect survival for the Sperm Whale as they would be too cold to mate, protect against predators, and to even find food. However, the Sperm Whale has adapted to the cold so much so that if they were on land they would die from the amount of heat they produce.[] The Sperm Whale has adapted to using layers of blubber to maintain heat and avoid dying of hyperthermia.[] In fact the Sperm Whale stores so much blubber to fight of the cold that it must eat up to 3% of its own body weight in one day to only maintain blubber supplies.[] This adaptation is what makes hunting its primary prey Giant Squid so much easier. This is because the Sperm Whale can now travel down deep all the way to where the Giant Squid live to hunt. The Sperm Whale is not the only species that uses layers of blubber to stay warm however. Seals, Sea Lions, Polar Bears, and even other species of Whale use layers of blubber to fight off the extreme cold of the environments they live in.[] Without the layers of blubber the Sperm Whale would be forced to stay very close to the surface of the ocean to avoid hyperthermia. This would make any effort to hunt useless as the Sperm Whale would be unable to find any prey large enough to supply it with enough energy. Without blubber the Sperm Whale would be forced to rely on prey inferior in mass and harder to catch than the Giant Squid to