Your on the cool calm seas, it’s a clear day no over cast, and you can smell and feel the crisp clean air filing your lungs, you take a glance out to sea and low and behold you sea a ripple in the distance and the head of an animal comes up and water spouts out, and quickly goes back under. You turn to your friend who also was staring in the same direction and say hey look did you see the whale? Your friend with a puzzled look on his face turns to you and say you mean a dolphin right?  Then the lady behind both of you interjects and says, no that there was a porpoise, a debate begins. So what’s the moral of the story?  It is a fact that most People excluding those within the field of biology can actually tell the difference between whales, dolphins or porpoises. They all look very similar to the untrained eye, and for the most part an average person might say, well a whale is bigger than the other two and from there you have a fifty/fifty chance to guess if it’s a dolphin or a porpoise. Well let’s see if we can raise that fifty/fifty to a guaranteed one hundred percent.

Lets start with the Basics, whales dolphins and porpoises are all from the same taxonomical group called Cetacea. All three are classified scientifically as mammals that live in the ocean, but there are many characteristics that actually distinguish these creatures from one another. All Ceteceans are roughly made the same; they all have a tail fluke and breathe through a blowhole. The Two suborders of Ceteceans are the Odontoceti or toothed whales and Mysticeti known as Baleen whales.

Dolphins and porpoises are in the suborder of Odontoceti because they are indeed carnivores, they feed on squid and fish and other smaller aquatic animals. All mammals from this class are able to utilize echolocation, which is their equivalent of our sonar, using sound waves to find objects, other organisms and even each other. Porpoises differ slightly in the design of their teeth they are spade shaped, the upper edges especially are very long and sharp as opposed to the pointy conically shaped teeth of the dolphin. A significant difference for whales on the other hand include the fact that toothed whales have one blow hole while baleen whales, that is whales that are not carnivores have two blowholes. This difference of course won’t serve you very well when you’re trying to spot them in the ocean, because they often surface and submerge so quickly you can’t even spot these detailed differences, but they are still facts.

Whales that are baleen, have a sieve-like, keratin material that hangs from the upper jaw, which is used to filter krill and zooplankton (small organisms) as their food source. Therefore a very interesting and little known fact emerges, Killer whales are not whales at all but are in fact dolphins. The fact that they have teeth and hunt their prey places them in the suborder Odontoceti. These differences so far list the subtle attributes that differentiates these three mammals, but as states earlier on a random day like in our example above you wouldn’t be able to hit the pause button and count how many blow holes the creature has or what size and shape are the teeth, of course not, time passes much too fast to allow this. So lets get down to some mainstream practicality shall we how can you tell by a split second glance what exactly are you looking at?  Well the number one obvious difference is size, between whales, dolphins and porpoises, by an extreme generality, you could say, Whales are the largest, dolphins are in the middle and Porpoises are the smallest, but you wouldn’t be receiving an A on any Biology tests with that answer. Lets get a little more technical. Porpoises are small and usually do not exceed seven feet in length; they look somewhat stocky in appearance and have flat heads. The porpoise dorsal fins are triangular in shape and in a quick glance can be mistaken for a shark. Porpoises also do not have a rostrum, the beak-like snout the dolphins have. Dolphins in comparison often are larger than ten feet in length and have melon shaped heads. Their dorsal fin curves gives the appearance of a wave’. Whales are known to be some of the largest mammals on earth; up to 105 feet long (Blue Whale). Baleen whales are generally larger than toothed whales but the scale difference is usually insignificant, despite the fact of known recorded unusual exceptions.

So what about life spans of these three creatures is there a difference in that department? Porpoises as the smallest of the three actually have the shortest life spans only about 10-20 years. But they make up for this short span by reproducing like crazy; the females can reproduce every year and can become pregnant within six weeks of giving birth, that’s a lot of porpoises! Dolphin females in contrast are sexually active at around eight (think dog years not human years) and will reproduce once every 2-3 years. Their age span ranges from 25-40 years. Dolphins tend to stay in a general location for their entire lives but may travel hundreds of miles in pursuit of food.  Whales generally have the longest life span of around 30-150 years depending on their overall environment and how much food they manage to catch each day plus other determining factors. Whales must travel in order to find food, mate and to bear offspring. They will often migrate thousands of miles each year to journey between their breeding and feeding grounds. Female whales are sexually active at around seven to ten years old; they however will nurse their calf for the entire year.

Finally lets take a quick look at these creatures’ personalities, which is also a key attribute to spot exactly what creature it is. Porpoises are generally thought to have roughly the same playful and loving demeanor as dolphins, just bite size versions. This is a misnomer, porpoises on the contrary are actually very shy creatures, and they do not engage in entertaining almost ostentatious antics like the dolphins do. They like to remain in groups of ten or so and when they surface they do so rather unobtrusively; with a rolling motion that makes them hard to see. These timid creatures generally avoid interaction with any boats.

Dolphins on the other hand love the spotlight, they are attention hogs, and they are smart, confident and full of life.  Dolphins swim and travel in long-term social groups called pods. Often pods will join together into herds, which can number into the hundreds. These social creatures can be seen playing in the wake of a boat’s bow; spinning and flipping in an acrobatic demonstration. Their curious nature also tends to get them caught in fishermen nets. Dolphins are incredibly social animals, like us they exhibit feelings and emotions, and are extremely intelligent, it is why humans are inevitably fascinated and enamored with their kind, because in some ways its what we would be like if we were them.

The Orca whales and the Baleen whales on the other hand are quite the polar opposites of dolphins, and make porpoises look like movie stars. These creatures are lone rangers, and they like their solitude.  They seldom ever travel with another of their kind, and its quite logical, if you were a 10 ton animal and you need to consume thousands of pounds of fish per day would you like a mooch in your area? Probably not. The only exception to this is obviously during mating times when they come together to procreate and prolong the species or calving processes when the mother stays close to her young-ling calf to protect and defend it in its vulnerable years.

Overall these are some very unique and amazing creatures and while they are very similar they are notable differences that truly make each of these a stand-alone marvel. Each of these creatures carries with it a unique and diversifying identity that defines and embraces its own individual essence. In fact to group these creatures as all the same would be as equally ignorant as saying Chinese, Koreans and Japanese people are all the same ethnicity. So take the time and learn about these wonderful awe inspiring creatures, learn their similarities and learn their differences, and above all respect them as you would any fellow human for they are God’s gifts to us.

Article Written by,

Tarek Khaleel