Killer Whale Essay

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SOUTHERN RESIDENT KILLER WHALE An English naturalist Charles Darwin (1802-1882) developed a theory of biological evolution. He studied variation in plants and animals during his five years’ voyage around the world in the 19th century. Darwin studied hundreds of species, which he researches variations between locations. His theory states that all species of organism arise and develop through natural selection. Natural selection is the process of organisms that adapt to their surrounding environment, which tend to survive and produce more offspring. Killer whales are remarked to have evolutionary links from land dwelling organisms, millions of years ago. This paper will display the evolution and natural selection of the killer whale. SCIENTIFIC NAME Orcinus Orca CLASSIFICATION The Killer Whale is a part of the toothed whale (odontoceti) suborder. The toothed whale suborder is consisted exclusively of porpoises, whales and dolphins that are born with teeth, instead of baleen plates. The Killer Whale is the largest animal in the dolphin family and is the only known to attack sharks, whales and other marine mammals. Scientific Classification o Kingdom: Animalia- This kingdom is characterised by eukaryotic and heterotrophic organisms, they …show more content…

Their dorsal fin is extremely long, tampered and pointed in a triangular shape or rounded and curved towards the end. The skull is oval shaped and the beak is extremely short and rounded at the end. The killer whale’s jaw is powerful with teeth that are able to tear apart flesh of their prey. They can withstand the jolting, wiggling and hurtling movements of prey that are trying to escape. The killer whale is born with a single blow hole instead of two. Their flippers are paddle shaped with rounded ends and flukes are tapered back and pointed at the end resembling to a triangle/pyramid

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