Balaenoptera bonaerensis Burmeister 1867

• Main Authors: Russell A. Mittermeier, Don E. Wilson
• Format: Other/Unknown Material
• Language: unknown
• Published: Lynx Edicions 2014
• Subjects: Biodiversity; Taxonomy; Animalia; Chordata; Mammalia; Cetacea; Balaenopteridae; Balaenoptera; Balaenoptera bonaerensis; Antarc*; Antarctic; Antarctic Minke whale; Antarctique*; minke whale; South Atlantic Ocean
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6596017; http://treatment.plazi.org/id/84551777FF86FFAFFA220B31F651F70A

2. Antarctic Minke Whale Balaenoptera bonaerensis French: Rorqual antarctique / German: Sudlicher Zwergwal / Spanish: Rorcual austral Other common names: Southern Minke Whale Taxonomy. Balaenoptera bonaerensis Burmeister, 1867, near Belgrano, Prov. Buenos Aires, Argentina. The type specimen was found at the mouth of Riachuelo Medrano, on the western shore of La Plata Estuary, in the South Atlantic Ocean. Until the 1990s, B. bonaerensis was considered to represent a large-bodied Southern Hemisphere subspecies of B. acutorostrata. Monotypic. Distribution. Southern Hemisphere, from tropical waters (7° S) to the edge of and within pack ice (65° S) around the Antarctic continent. One record from off the coast of Suriname (4° N) in the Northern Hemisphere. Descriptive notes. Total length 840-1020 cm; weight 6800-11,000 kg. Adult female Antarctic Minke Whales may be up to 100 cm longer than males. Mean lengths of sexually mature females and males are 900 cm and 840 cm, respectively. The Antarctic Minke Whale is the second smallest species of rorquals, after the Common Minke Whale (B. acutorostrata), and it has a dark-gray to black back and an almost all white ventral area. Along sides of body, back, and underbelly, colorations meet to form a diffuse, light-gray zone oftransition, generally with a diffuse boundary between gray and black. A dark thorax field separates discrete, light-gray lateral patches on anterior portion of thorax and posterior flank. Typically, there are two light-gray wavy streaks extending posterolaterally from near blowhole. The Antarctic Minke Whale has slim and pointed pectoralflippers that typically are solid gray, with white leading edges and lacking distinctive brilliant white pectoral band that characterizes Northern and Southern Hemisphere forms of the Common Minke Whale. Undersides offlippers and caudal flukes of the Antarctic Minke Whale are white with a dark-gray trim. Head is marked by a single, prominent, median rostral ridge that extends from blowhole to tip of snout. Like the head of ...