Right-Whale Dolphin

Right-Whale Dolphin 

any one mammal of the genus Lissodelphis of the family Delphinidae of the suborder Odontoceti (toothed whales). The body is thin and the head small. There is a low frontal process above the upper jaw; there is no dorsal fin as in the right whales (Balaenidae). The caudal peduncle is thin and low. The teeth (168–192) are sharp and thin (3 mm in diameter). Right-whale dolphins feed on cephalopod mollusks and fish.

There are two species. L. borealis measures about 2.5 m long and weighs about 70 kg. It is almost completely black. Only the chest between the fins, the part under the flukes, and a narrow band from the chest to the tail are white. It is found in the North Pacific; in the waters of the USSR it is found near the Kurile Ridge. L.peroni measures about 2.28m long and weighs about 60 kg. The abdomen is white and the flukes, back, and part of the sides are black. It is distributed in the southern hemisphere from the temperate latitudes to the antarctic.

REFERENCES

Tomilin, A. G. Kitoobraznye. Moscow, 1957. (Zveri SSSR i prelezhashchikh stran, vol. 8.)
Zhizn’zhivotnykh, vol. 6. Moscow, 1971.

A. G. TOMILIN