The Pygmy Killer Whale (Feresa Attenuata) is also known as the slender pilot whale and the slender blackfish as well. This species very closely resembles the melon-headed and the false killer whales. This round-headed whale has a very small and slender body with a length of about 245 cm (8.5 ft.). Its maximum weight is about 225 kg (495 lbs). It has large dorsal fin and rounded tips of flipper. There are 8 to 11 pairs of teeth on its upper jaw and 11 to 13 pairs of teeth on its bottom jaw. The pygmy killer whale has 68 to 71 vertebrae in its backbone.It is dark black, grey-brown, and blue-black in color. Its lips, the lower jaw (often the entire jaw), the beak, and the genitals are white. There is a gray patch which extends from its throat to its vent area. The pygmy killer whale is believed to extrude its eyes from its sockets which enable it to look behind itself. These whales can be found in tropical and subtropical waters worldwide. They prefer deep waters away from coastline areas. They are found in the Gulf of Mexico, the Mediterranean Sea, the Indian Ocean, the Southeastern Atlantic Ocean, and near Sri Lanka and Lesser Antilles. They are thought to live year-round in at least the Gulf of Mexico.
Pygmy killer whales eat large fish like
There is not much knowledge about the breeding habits of the pygmy killer whale. Both the sexes reach their sexual maturity when they are 7 ft long. The young ones are 32 inches (81.28 cm) in length at birth.
The pygmy killer whales are sometimes trapped in the nets of Japanese fishermen. Every year, Sri Lankans capture pygmy killer whales in large numbers (as much as 300 to 800 whales). Many others get entangled in the fishing nets and are killed throughout the world. Some are trapped only to trap tuna fish. The pygmy killer whale is already seen lesser in the wild wit every passing year and these activities have been posing a danger to its existence since a long time.
The pygmy killer whale first came into light when two skulls of an unknown species were discovered. Its actual specimens came into existence only in 1950. Even today, the pygmy killer whale is not sighted on the sea very often. Mostly, they become familiar as and when they get trapped in net entanglements.
The pygmy killer whale belongs to the dolphin family (Delphinidae) and the killer whale, the melon-head whale, the false killer whale, the short-finned pilot whale, and the long-finned pilot whale can be considered its cousins belonging to the same family.
The Pygmy killer whale, slender blackfish is listed as Data Deficient (DD), inadequate information to make a direct, or indirect, assessment of its risk of extinction, on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species
