Friday 28 June 2013

The Whale Shark's Remarkable Diet And Anatomy

By Linda Patterson


A mouthful of teeth and a constantly-hungry stomach is the best description to fit the whale shark. Though the description might be fitting yet it has nothing to do with the real truth. In reality, in terms of diet, the whale sharks are very different from other sharks.

The Whale Sharks are actually viewed as filter-feeders. They chiefly feed on plankton, krill, macro-algae, small nektonic vertebrates, small fishes and squids. A unique oral anatomy is possesed by the whale sharks which enables it to filter for food, gulp in the water and expulse water through its gills.

Unlike other sharks, the whale sharks don't have big sharp teeth. In actual fact, the size of their teeth is somewhat smaller seeing that their teeth provide no real use as part of feeding. To paraphrase, whale sharks never munch their food. As filter-feeders, these mentioned whale sharks possess a unique raking mechanism attached in their gills which serves to filter food from the water they gulp in. Their filter-feeding characteristics makes their diet interesting, odd but logic.

Filter-feeding

Rather than preying on fishes, a whale shark gulp in water full of tiny fishes, plankton and macro-algae. After that, it closes its mouth to retain the water within, that is funneled through the gill flaps, where water is eliminated. The majority of the food particles are caught from the dermal denticles lining the whale shark's pharynx as well as gill plates. They have gills which have fine sieve-like contraptions which are made use of to sifter planktons. These filters are only 2-3 mm in diameter, prevent anything apart from water as well as smaller food particles from getting away.

Just about any organic material which is stuck between the gill filters is swallowed in soon after. For a human point of view, the theory of filter-feeding would seem really quite troublesome. You can definitely find it difficult to fully grasp making use of your mouth like a sponge filter and also swallowing the dirt that amasses in the filter. Even if whale sharks are extremely well experienced in regards to filter-feeding, yet the difficulty regarding it is not really lost for them. More often than not, these whale sharks are reported coughing because they are unable to swallow all the food particles trapped in their gill filters. At some point, the food particles there collect and additionally clog up the filters, making it tough to eat with no need of coughing and, quite possibly, choking.

Did you know that the whale sharks ar active feeders?. In contrast to some other shark species, or fishes for instance, whale sharks hardly ever give up eating. Due to the fact that filter-feeding also doesn't need them to run after for food, whale sharks can easily drink in water even if they're resting in stationary position.

Various Other Filter-feeder Sharks

The basking shark as well as megamouth shark are among the shark species that filter-feeders. The basking shark doesn't filter-feed the manner in which whale sharks do. As an alternative to gulping and also expelling water thru their gills, basking sharks basically "basks," hence forcing the water to circulate by using their gills. The food particles are in that case accumulated and also swallowed.

The truth is, whale sharks are varies greatly from what you firstly suspected them to be. Their teeth serve no purpose as they are filter-feeders; not to mention they do not have big pointy teeth.




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