WASHINGTON—The first study to methodically calculate how much food blue whales and some other similar-looking types eat has yielded a simple answer: a whole lot.
The blue whale, the largest animal on Earth, eats about 16 tons of krill daily in the North Pacific, gobbling up these tiny shrimp-like crustaceans with a filter-feeding system in the mouth using baleen plates made of keratin, the substance found in people’s fingernails, scientists said on Wednesday.
