As the largest fish in the sea, reaching lengths of 40 feet (12
meters) or more, whale sharks have an enormous menu from which to
choose. Fortunately for most sea-dweller sand us!Their favorite meal is
plankton. They scoop these tiny plants and animals up, along with any
small fish that happen to be around, with their colossal gaping mouths
while swimming close to the water's surface.
The whale shark, like
the world's second largest fish, the basking shark, is a filter
feeder. In order to eat, the beast juts out its formidably sized jaws
and passively filters everything in its pathThe mechanism is
theorized to be a technique called “cross-flow filtration,” similar to
some bony fish and baleen whales.
The whale shark's flattened head sports a blunt snout above its mouth
with short barbels protruding from its nostrils. Its back and sides are
gray to brown with white spots among pale vertical and horizontal
stripes, and its belly is white. Its two dorsal fins are set rearward on
its body, which ends in a large dual-lobbed caudal fin (or tail).
Preferring
warm waters, whale sharks populate all tropical seas. They are known to
migrate every spring to the continental shelf of the central west coast
of Australia. The coral spawning of the area's Ningaloo Reef provides
the whale shark with an abundant supply of plankton.
Although
massive, whale sharks are docile fish and sometimes allow swimmers to
hitch a ride. They are currently listed as a vulnerable species;
however, they continue to be hunted in parts of Asia, such as the
Philippines.
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