Another awesome whale cartoon from Anton van Helden, Te Papa’s marine mammal scientist.
Just click on the picture, print it out, and colour however you like – spots, rainbows, stripes…!
Wacky whales (pdf, 426 KB)
See if you can name all the whales in the picture.
If you need help, visit the Whales l Tohorā exhibition and take a look at the whale models.
Science Express takes place on the first Thursday of every month, here at Te Papa.
On Thursday 3 April, Anton van Helden, Te Papa’s Collection Manager, Marine Mammals, talked about current whale research.
Listen to Anton’s talk here:
http://www.tepapa.govt.nz/ScienceExpress/ScienceExpress_2008-04_The.World.Of.Whales.mp3
The next Science Express, on Thursday 1 May, also links to whales. If you’ve watched Search and Destroy in Whales Tohorā and seen the sperm whale hunting a giant squid, you won’t want to miss it!
Science Express @ Te Papa: Colossal Squid: The Dissection
The biggest colossal squid ever caught is stored in Te Papa. Join world-renowned marine biologist Dr Steve O’Shea to discuss the findings from its dissection.
Proudly supported by GNS Science and the Royal Society of New Zealand, Wellington Branch.
Thursday 1 May, 6.30pm–8pm.
Level 4 Espresso. Free entry.
Big whales mean big genitals!
A blue whale’s penis can be 3 metres (10 feet) long and 30 centimetres (12 inches) in diameter. The testicles of a blue whale can weigh 45 kilograms (100 pounds) each!
Ka whai taihemahema nui ngā tohorā nui!
E 3 mita pea te roa o te ure o te tohorā kahurangi, me te 30 mitarau pea te whitianga. Tae atu ki te 45 manokaramu pea te taumaha o tētahi raho o te tohorā kahurangi!
Large animals often have large brains. Dolphins have disproportionately large brains compared to their body size – just like humans.
Whales and dolphins are highly intelligent. They belong to a handful of mammals that can recognise themselves in a mirror. This group includes humans, some apes, and some elephants.
Ko te tikanga, whai roro nui ai ngā kararehe nui. He tuwhene te rahi o te roro o te aihe ki te rahi o te tinana – pēnei i te tangata.
Tino ihumanea te tohorā me te aihe. Nō te rōpū whāngote ēnei ka taea te tāutu i a rātou ake i roto i tētahi whakaata. Kei taua rōpū ko te tangata, ētahi momo makimaki, me ētahi arewhana.
Blue whales have the biggest babies in the world! They are more than 7 metres (23 feet) long at birth and weigh 2722 kilograms (3 tons).
Did you know?
Baby whales don’t suckle like humans. The mother whale forces milk out of her nipple hidden in the mammary slit.
Kāore te miha pakake e ngote ū pēnei i te tangata. Ka uruhi te wērā whaea i te waiū i tōna kōmata e hunaia ana i roto i te hahae ū.
The blue whale is one of the biggest animals that ever lived on earth.
It grows up to 30 metres (98 feet) long and can weigh over 150 tonnes (165 tons).
Despite their enormous size, very little is known about blue whales. Their routes through the ocean are a mystery, and so is where they go to breed.
During the 20th century, whale hunters killed about 350,000 blue whales. Today there are about 2000 left on the planet.
The Whales Tohorā team came across some amazing info as we put together the Whales Tohorā exhibition. Things we never knew!
And we’re lucky that our marine mammal scientist Anton van Helden is a great cartoonist – and loves drawing whales!
So now we’d like to share some of this info with you – we’ll be posting regular ‘whales fab facts’ here, so check back often.
Whales Fab Fact 1
A humpback whale flipper is the longest ‘arm’ in the world. It can measure up to 5 metres (16 feet) – one third of the whale’s overall length.
Ko te pakihau o te paikea te ‘ringa roa rawa’ kei te ao nei. Tae atu ki te 5 mita pea tana roa – ko te hautoru tēnā o te roa katoa o te paikea.
The long, curved cry of whale song filled Te Papa’s marae in January this year.
Richard Nunns, an authority on ngā taonga pūoro (Māori musical instruments), with the New Zealand String Quartet, was here to play a work by New Zealand composer Gillian Whitehead.
Puhake ki te rangi, translates as ‘spouting to the skies’. It’s a celebration of whales and was written specially for Richard Nunns and the string quartet in late 2006.
The taonga pūoro played in the piece are made from whale bone and whale teeth. They range from the tumutumu, a percussion instrument made from the jaw of a pilot whale, to nguru, or flutes, carved from sperm whale teeth.
Te Papa visitors were able to see these incredible taonga pūoro close up and find out more about their uses – but most importantly, they had the chance to hear Richard play them.
Each instrument has a story and a unique voice – in future posts we’ll explore these and bring you some of their sounds.
Every year, a lively and enthusiastic group of scientists meets at the University of Auckland School of Biological Sciences to compare notes about whales.
The South Pacific Whales Research Consortium (SPWRC) first met in 1999 as a group of friends who wanted to share their whale research. The group has grown since then and now plays a vital role in coordinating and reporting on non-lethal whale research in the South Pacific.
Their work will help strengthen the New Zealand Government’s case to ban whaling in the Southern Ocean at the International Whaling Commission annual meeting in Chile in June 2008. Michael Poole is a founding member of SPWRC and has spent more than 20 years researching whales and dolphins in French Polynesia.
Listen to Michael Poole talking about his fascinating whale research on the island of Mo’orea,Tahiti (duration about 6 minutes).
Michael Poole interview.mp3 (6.19 mB)
Michael Poole and Anton van Helden at the SPWRC meeting in Auckland, 6 February 2008.
Since Whales | Tohorā opened at Te Papa on 1 December 2007, visitors of all ages have been touched by these extraordinary mammals and their stories.
Almost 90,000 people from all over the world have come to see the exhibition – over 3,000 attended on Saturday 16 February alone! (Te Papa’s 10th birthday celebrations).
Bruce Roberts, leader of the team of Te Papa Hosts on the floor in the exhibition, gets to hear some special comments:
A heart surgeon really liked the life-size model of the blue whale heart and said, ‘if humans had arteries that size I’d be a happy man’!!
Some visitors hoped to see live whales in the exhibition – maybe in a big tank?! We haven’t worked out yet how we’d feed them … the whales that is!
Recently, we were given a special CD – a whale song made up and recorded by children age 2-5 years from Toddlers Turf Childcare Centre, Manukau, Auckland.
Artwork for Save the Whales CD by children from Toddlers Turf Childcare Centre, Auckland
Part of the money raised from sales of the CD will be given to The Great Whale Trail – a donation account with Greenpeace to help track whales and end whaling in the Southern Ocean.
Hear an extract of the song (mp3, 1.12 MB)
To buy the CD you can contact Blakelock Records (09) 263 7625 or email blakelockrecords@xtra.co.nz
These are just a few examples of how Whales | Tohorā is touching people’s lives – has it touched yours?
Write in and share a story with us!
