Plus side for squick thoughts, probably not that warm. The ocean is quite cold and things lose heat 25 times faster in water than air, so it would likely cool down considerably between being…… extruded…? And consumed.
Then again, I don’t know a whales body temp to start with, so there might be a lot of heat to lose. Idk if that’s better or worse…
Apparently whales are ~36°, about the same as humans. I’m not a biologist or anything, but I wonder why they maintain such a high body temperature, considering how difficult that is in the ocean lol.
Still, I wouldn’t be surprised if the milk is quite a bit colder by the time it gets to the baby.
Here’s, uh… definitely the strangest youtube video I’ve watched this week, but I thought it was interesting. ¯\(ツ)/¯
So I’m not a biologist either but I’m going to speculate on the temp thing. (Somewhat educated speculation - science of all varieties is my jam)
Basically my hypothesis is that between insulation and size, they aren’t capable of losing heat fast enough to fall below their baseline temp, but any old temp would probably have worked fine, as long as their fats stay liquid (and for all I know that’s 36C, but that seems highly unlikely - you’d want to be several degrees warmer in case of emergency, else you’d get stiff and die for sure).
They have a nice layer of fat for insulation and that’s all well and good, but they are massively huge and a lot more spherical than most animals. So, they have a small surface area to volume ratio, and lose heat slower as a result. And because they are huge, and muscle twitch is heat generating (to say nothing of leaky heat-producing brown fat, idk if they have this, but most mammals seem to for thermoregulation), they likely produce a gob of heat internally just existing. Much like we believe the larger dinosaurs were endothermic due to sheer size (and some evidence from their bone structure).
Side note - Imagine how many calories it would take to maintain basal metabolic rate when you are losing that heat to 4C water at literally all times. It takes us about 1500-2000 calories for this function and we only lose heat to air that’s relatively close to our body temp.
I did a super quick scan of melting points of various fats, and while without knowing exact compositions of whale blubber idk the melting point, a surprising amount of the animal fats we use for cooking melt around 25-40C, with most large terrestrial animals (cow, pig, deer, etc.) falling between 32-40C (goose fat was the 25C).
If their composition hadn’t worked, though, they could have evolved a polyunsaturated fat (like fish oil) with a lower melting point.
How TF does a baby whale nurse then? The momma whale is essentially pooping lard out of her nipple? That’s a visual I didn’t expect today.
? it just drinks it? like sure its thick but it still flows
The analogy of toothpaste was used but yoghurt in a poch might be a better analogy.
Imagine dairy flavored toothpaste
Why imagine when you can live it? (Just don’t tell them it isn’t for your cat when ordering)
Edit: someone’s already pondered this
https://youtu.be/-O0e2Q7wCt4
High pressure washer style
I know this one! Baby latches on and Mama pumps a big gulp of milk, baby swallows one, done! So baby doesn’t have to hold it’s breath too long.
The address is the ad doesn’t exist, though. Which is good because there’s no way anyone could ethically harvest whale milk.
? it just drinks it? like sure its thick but it still flows
So maybe more like a milkshake? Her milkshake brings all the calves to the yard?
Warm milkshake
Plus side for squick thoughts, probably not that warm. The ocean is quite cold and things lose heat 25 times faster in water than air, so it would likely cool down considerably between being…… extruded…? And consumed.
Then again, I don’t know a whales body temp to start with, so there might be a lot of heat to lose. Idk if that’s better or worse…
Good point!!
Apparently whales are ~36°, about the same as humans. I’m not a biologist or anything, but I wonder why they maintain such a high body temperature, considering how difficult that is in the ocean lol.
Still, I wouldn’t be surprised if the milk is quite a bit colder by the time it gets to the baby.
Here’s, uh… definitely the strangest youtube video I’ve watched this week, but I thought it was interesting. ¯\(ツ)/¯
https://youtu.be/I-NvBXQ4cNs?si=tdftmQoopATTX1_a
So I’m not a biologist either but I’m going to speculate on the temp thing. (Somewhat educated speculation - science of all varieties is my jam)
Basically my hypothesis is that between insulation and size, they aren’t capable of losing heat fast enough to fall below their baseline temp, but any old temp would probably have worked fine, as long as their fats stay liquid (and for all I know that’s 36C, but that seems highly unlikely - you’d want to be several degrees warmer in case of emergency, else you’d get stiff and die for sure).
They have a nice layer of fat for insulation and that’s all well and good, but they are massively huge and a lot more spherical than most animals. So, they have a small surface area to volume ratio, and lose heat slower as a result. And because they are huge, and muscle twitch is heat generating (to say nothing of leaky heat-producing brown fat, idk if they have this, but most mammals seem to for thermoregulation), they likely produce a gob of heat internally just existing. Much like we believe the larger dinosaurs were endothermic due to sheer size (and some evidence from their bone structure).
Side note - Imagine how many calories it would take to maintain basal metabolic rate when you are losing that heat to 4C water at literally all times. It takes us about 1500-2000 calories for this function and we only lose heat to air that’s relatively close to our body temp.
I did a super quick scan of melting points of various fats, and while without knowing exact compositions of whale blubber idk the melting point, a surprising amount of the animal fats we use for cooking melt around 25-40C, with most large terrestrial animals (cow, pig, deer, etc.) falling between 32-40C (goose fat was the 25C).
If their composition hadn’t worked, though, they could have evolved a polyunsaturated fat (like fish oil) with a lower melting point.
Anyway, thanks for coming to my ted talk ;)