THE DELPHINIDES BIG

GLOBICÉPHALE NOİR

Globicephala melaena: 5,50 - 8,50 m; 3 in 5 t (females: 3,80 in 6 m, 1,8 in 2,5 t); grey steel or black, white spot on the throat(breast), almost no beak, very long fins.

 Moderate and cold waters; all the oceans except the peace-loving person.

 Food: cephalopods, cods.

GLOBİCÉPHALE TROPİCAL

Globicephala macrohynchus: 4 - 4,50 m; 2,50 t (females: 3,30 in 4 m; 1,3 t); similar to melaena G., much smaller fins.

Warm and tropical moderate waters.

 Food: cephalopods.

FORGERY KILLER WHALE, OR PSEUDORQUE

Pseudorca crassidens: 5 - 6,10 m; 1,4 t (females: 4 à4,90 m, 1,2 t max.); black stains grey between the pectoral, lengthened and rounded(stretched out and rounded) off head, no beak, narrow fins.

Warm and tropical moderate waters.

 Food: cephalopods, big fishes (sea bream).

KILLER WHALE

Orcinus orca: 6,50 - 9,50 m; 4 in 8 t; (females: 5,50 in 7 m, 2,5 in 4 t); black and characteristic white, conical head without beak, triangular very developed dorsal fin to males(mates), falciforme to females.

 Coasts and open sea; cosmopolitan.

 Food: young whales, dolphins(dauphins), seals, penguins, water birds, tortoises, fishes.

DOLPHINS OF FRESH WATER

There were question up to here only maritime dolphins(dauphins), and more specially the one who was the best studied: Tursiops

However, there is a group of very particular dolphins(dauphins) living completely or partially in fresh water: Platanistidae in their set(group), more two kinds(genres) of Stenidae (Sousa and Sotalia) and Delphinidé (Orcaella du Mékong, at the same moment river and coastal). Platanistes is remarkable by their long beak and by the presence of a well marked neck, a very rare character to Cetaceans. The plataniste of the Ganges, the Indus and of the Brahmaputra, the susu, is completely blind; he(it) feeds on shrimps of fresh water or on fishes fossorial animals which he(it) looks for in the mud of fleuves.e lipotes, or pei it hi, of the lake Tungt' ing, in China, possesses very reduced eyes and in little not functional meadows; he(it) has for usual preys of silurid anguilliformes living in the mud. The bouto (Inia geoffrensis) of high the Amazon and of Orénoque has a normal sight and is exclusively ichtyophage; He leaves, during the period of high tides, the bed of the river sometimes to risks in the flooded forest. As for dolphin(dauphin) of the Plata ( Pontoporia), more eclectic, he(it) attacks(affects) as well fishes (particularly Gupéidés) as shrimps and squids. During winter, he(it) leaves the fresh water of estuaries and goes(surrenders) in coastal navy waters.

Sousa (Southern Asia, west coasts and is from Africa: Zanzibar, Senegal, Cameroon) and Sotalia (pond of the Amazon and the Orénoque, Brazil in Venezuela and can be to Florida) are also sorts of estuary crossing(spending) navy waters in fresh water. A shape (Sotalia fluviatilis) is exclusively dulçaquicole; all these dolphins(dauphins) are ichtyophages.

Sousa teuszi was indicated for a long time as the only Cetacean herbivore. It is an error there which was recently corrected: this sort is carnivorous, as are the other Cetaceans.

The error resulted from a confusion with another aquatic Mammal, the manatee, which belongs to the order of Siréniens, and is in fact completely herbivore