The largest living creature that ever existed.
Day 53 / 365
You probably know that the largest animal today is the blue whale. How much bigger would you say the largest dinosaurs were than our present day blue whales? Were they twice as big? Or 10 times as big?
Well, that’s kind of a trick question. The blue whale is actually larger than any of the dinosaurs. It's the largest animal that has ever existed on this planet.
Blue whales are huge. They can be 80–100 feet long, and weigh about 200 tonnes. And they are fast as well, their speeds can go up to 20 miles per hour. To give you a reference point, Michael Phelps’ swimming speed capped off at about 6 miles per hour.
All this makes it hard to believe that we have almost hunted them into extinction.
“Whaling”, which stands for hunting of whales, became extremely popular in the early 1900s. Almost 99% of the whale population was killed during this period. Common sense prevailed around the 1960s when whaling was outlawed. The population, however, is still far from recovered.
It was the big asteroid that wiped the dinosaurs off the earth. For it’s mightiest creature, however, it seems us humans have been enough.
This story is part of my 365 Day Project for 2019. Read about it here
Yesterday’s blog — How to keep clutter away