Blue whales are the largest creatures on the planet, stretching 80 to 100 feet long and weighing in upwards of 290,000 to 330,000 pounds. However, despite their size, marine biologists say they now have evidence that these behemoths are actually mating with another species.
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00:04 Blue whales are the largest creatures on the planet, stretching 80 to 100 feet long and
00:09 weighing upwards of 290,000 to 330,000 pounds.
00:14 However, despite their size, marine biologists say they now have evidence that these behemoths
00:18 are actually mating with another species.
00:21 The discovery was made during genome sequencing of North Atlantic blue whales, finding that
00:25 3.5% of their DNA was actually fin whale DNA.
00:29 Fin whales are still quite large, but not nearly as big as their apparent blue whale
00:33 mates.
00:34 Fin whales average a length of around 70 feet and weigh upwards of 100,000 pounds.
00:39 The researchers say they were not only surprised at such a high percentage of DNA coming from
00:43 fin whales, but that every blue whale sampled had at least some of it.
00:47 This is especially wild considering that most hybrid animals are infertile.
00:50 Yet that doesn't seem to be the case with the offspring of these two whale species.
00:54 Experts say this is likely due to them still being quite close on the evolutionary tree.
00:59 However, the biologists note that while blue whales all have some fin whale DNA, the opposite
01:03 isn't true.
01:04 This is believed to be the result of limited blue whales to mate with, meaning blue whales
01:08 might be the only ones that will mate with the hybrid whales.
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