The sperm whale is the world’s largest toothed predator. It also has the largest brain, the largest nose, and lives its life among a strongly bonded family group. These factors alone make sperm whales among the most fascinating creatures on Earth, and a species I am captivated by.

Longer than wider, 3,800 kilometers separate the western most point from the distant eastern shore, while its greatest breadth does not exceed 700km. Its average depth is 1,429 meters, and its surface covers an area of 2.5 million square kilometers, about 1% of the total of the surface of the world’s oceans.

This is the first of a five-part series called “Whales of an Ancient Sea”. In this episode, earthOCEAN explore the geology, and oceanographic history of the ancient Mediterranean Sea. They discover the species of cetaceans (whales, dolphins and porpoises) inhabiting the basin, talk with the scientists who work for the conservation of the species and their various habitats.

River dolphins are a disparate group of four species of cetacean. You will notice from the Latin names in italics that each of these dolphins belong to different genera, in fact they each belong to separate families, – there is a lot of mammalian evolution represented among this group.

Discover more about the lives of southern right whales in Argentina. Follow the research of international scientists working to understand and protect these whales, and their marine environment.

Once abundant and globally distributed, right whales were the first and most heavily exploited whales. Although some populations are showing healthy signs of recovery, right whales are classified as endangered under the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) red list, and the Convention for the International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES).

Everybody remembers seeing their first whale, and most people experience their first close encounter on a whale watch trip. For me, it was a magnificent blue whale off Monterey Bay, California. But watching whales in Patagonia is a whale watching experience like no other, watching whales here, is truly a close encounter! Southern right whales in Peninsula Valdés are perhaps the best-known wild cetaceans on earth. I made my first acquaintance with these right whales last year, and felt compelled to return to see them again.