Sperm Whales

Alright, motherfuckers. Today, we gon' talk 'bout SPERM whales.

Sperm whales are quite distinctive. From its blocky appearance to its sometimes pruny-looking skin, it's hard to confuse this whale with another. It also has ridges where you might expect a dorsal fin, which is pretty neat, and its tail is the largest proportionally out of all the other cetaceans.

But, before we get started on anything else, let's talk about WHY they're called sperm whales. It has to do with an oily fluid found in whale's spermaceti organ at the top of its head. Originally, the substance was thought to be the whale's sperm. As for why they thought sperm would be stored in the head I...I can't really understand that. In other news, the word spermaceti sounds arguably MORE hilarious. Spermaceti whales. Alternatively, you could also call them a “cachalot.” Um..yeah.

Scientists don't fully understand the purpose of spermaceti just yet, but they think that it might help the animal regulate buoyancy or help focus its echolocation. Whalers, on the other hand, didn't care so much about how the animal's used it, just how useful it was to them.

So, going for more records here, the sperm whale HAS:

The largest and heaviest brain out of all animals
The largest cerebrum of all mammals, both in absolute and relative terms

and IS:

The largest of all the toothed whales (odontoceti)
The second deepest diving--okay, hold up, I didn't realize this. CURVIER'S BEAKED WHALE is FIRST? What the fffUCK?

You sneaky mother FUCKER.

These next instances are too cool to not share a bunch of gifs, sorrynotsorry.

Sperm whales are probably most known for their giant squidy prey in the dark, murky depths, but did you know that the use of their teeth might not be necessary? There are plenty of animals that are well fed who have no teeth or even deformed jaws. It's hypothesized that the teeth may be used for aggression between males based on scars found on a mature male's body. Oh, and it's also thought that they might hunt megamouth sharks. Craaazy.

Although, they seem to have figured out another use for their teeth, much to the disappointment of certain fishermen.

Social structure for sperm whales is actually a little amusing. Pods are comprised of maybe a dozen females whose sole purpose is to protect the young, sick, and injured. Males will leave these pods at about 4-21 years of age and join smaller bachelor groups, and the oldest males will live out their lives alone. Poor guys. Though, you know, if they had to live around THAT many chatty women, could you really blame them? Could you? The nice thing about this pod structure is that the responsibilities of hunting vs being nanny can be split amongst the group, though I'm pretty sure I've seen sperm whale calves floating at the surface alone, but the mother can keep track of its baby using echolocation, so that's nice. Babies can't dive as deeply as they need to, so the abandonment is pretty necessary.

Nowadays, sperm whales don't have many predatorial threats except for...

Oh my god, guys, GUYS, can you guess it? Can you? I'm not sure if you got this, so let me help.

Orca tax.