{"id":30539,"date":"2025-03-04T09:34:47","date_gmt":"2025-03-04T04:04:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=30539"},"modified":"2025-04-11T08:16:26","modified_gmt":"2025-04-11T02:46:26","slug":"narwhals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/narwhals\/","title":{"rendered":"Narwhals"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>Narwhals Latest News<\/h2>\n<p>In a first, scientists have studied and captured footage of the iconic narwhals of the Arctic using their tusks to hunt.\u00a0<\/p>\n<h2>About Narwhals<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>It is also known as a narwhale (Monodon monoceros), is a <strong>medium-sized toothed whale<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>It has a big<strong> horn-like tusk which gives<\/strong> them a very distinctive appearance.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Features of Narwhals<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Narwhals <strong>change color as they age<\/strong>. Newborns are a blue-gray, juveniles are blue-black and adults are a mottled gray. Old narwhals are nearly all white.<\/li>\n<li>The tusk is, <strong>in fact, a tooth<\/strong> that <strong>grows out of the male&#8217;s upper jaw and <\/strong>has <strong>sensory capability<\/strong> and up to 10 million nerve endings inside.<\/li>\n<li>It is believed that the tusk plays a role in <strong>competition for mates, including mating displays<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>It uses tusks in the wild to <strong>investigate, manipulate and influence<\/strong> the behavior of Arctic char (Salvelinus alpinus), including delivering sufficient force with their tusks to stun and <strong>possibly kill the fish.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>They exhibited remarkable dexterity, precision and speed of movement of the tusk, and regularly made <strong>adjustments to track the moving target<\/strong>. The tusk, especially the <strong>tip of the tusk<\/strong>, was <strong>used to interrogate and manipulate the target<\/strong> by brief contacts.<\/li>\n<li>Narwhals are <strong>polygynous<\/strong> and mating usually occurs from <strong>March to May.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>They give birth to a single calf and they are born tail first. The <strong>tusks of males do not grow<\/strong> until they are weaned when they are <strong>about one year old.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Diet:<\/strong> Narwhals feed on Greenland halibut, Arctic and polar cod, squid and shrimp.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Distribution of Narwhals:<\/strong> They spend their lives in the <strong>Arctic waters<\/strong> of <strong>Canada, Greenland, Norway and Russia.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Threats:<\/strong> Oil and gas development and climate change pose threats to narwhals.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Conservation Status of Narwhals<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>IUCN:<\/strong> Near Threatened<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Narwhals FAQs<\/h2>\n<p><strong>Q1. <\/strong>Why are narwhals so rare?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ans.<\/strong> Narwhals are threatened by climate change, the fishing industry, hunting, and contaminated environments.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Q2. <\/strong>Why are narwhals called unicorns of the sea?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ans.<\/strong> In medieval times, narwhals were hunted for their tusks, and people would sell them as unicorn horns<\/p>\n<p><strong>Q3. <\/strong>What is the difference between a whale and a narwhal?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ans. <\/strong>The narwhal is an odontocete or toothed whale, but is different from all other toothed whales in that it has no teeth in its mouth.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.downtoearth.org.in\/wildlife-biodiversity\/sea-unicorns-narwhals-studied-for-the-first-time-using-their-tusks-to-hunt-fish-forage-and-play\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">DTH<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Narwhals, also known as a narwhale (Monodon monoceros), is a medium-sized toothed whale<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":30540,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-30539","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30539","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30539"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30539\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30540"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30539"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30539"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30539"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}