Whale in the context of "Guaitecas Archipelago"

Whales use a variety of sounds for communication and sensation. The mechanisms used to produce sound vary from one family of cetaceans to another. Marine mammals, including whales, dolphins, and porpoises, are much more dependent on sound than land mammals due to the limited effectiveness of other senses in water. Sight is less effective for marine mammals because of the way particulates in the ocean scatter light. Smell is also limited, as molecules diffuse more slowly in water than in air, which makes smelling less effective. However, the speed of sound is roughly three times greater in water than in the atmosphere at sea level. As sea mammals are so dependent on hearing to communicate and feed, environmentalists and cetologists are concerned that they are being harmed by the increased ambient noise in the world's oceans caused by ships, sonar and marine seismic surveys.

The word "song" is used to describe the pattern of regular and predictable sounds made by some species of whales, notably the humpback whale. This is included with or in comparison with music, and male humpback whales have been described as "inveterate composers" of songs that are "'strikingly similar' to human musical traditions". This position has been complicated by more recent research, however. It has been suggested that humpback songs communicate male fitness to female whales, although this explanation has been challenged on various grounds.

A water deity is a deity in mythology associated with water or various bodies of water. Water deities are common in mythology and were usually more important among civilizations in which the sea or ocean, or a great river was more important. Another important focus of worship of water deities has been springs or holy wells.

As a form of animal worship, whales and snakes (hence dragons) have been regarded as godly deities throughout the world (as are other animals such as turtles, fish, crabs, and sharks). In Asian lore, whales and dragons sometimes have connections. Serpents are also common as a symbol or as serpentine deities, sharing many similarities with dragons.

Terrestrial animals are animals that live predominantly or entirely on land (e.g., cats, chickens, ants, most spiders), as compared with aquatic animals (e.g., fish, whales, octopuses, lobsters, etc.), who live predominantly or entirely in bodies of water; and semiaquatic animals (e.g., crocodilians, seals, platypus and most amphibians), who inhabit coastal, riparian or wetland areas and rely on both aquatic and terrestrial habitats. While most insects (who constitute over half of all known species in the animal kingdom) are terrestrial, some groups, such as mosquitoes and dragonflies, spend their egg and larval stages in water but emerge as fully terrestrial adults (imagos) after completing metamorphosis.

Terrestrial animals conduct respiratory gas exchange directly with the atmosphere, typically via specialized respiratory organs known as lungs, or via cutaneous respiration across the skin. They have also evolved homeostatic features such as impermeable cuticles that can restrict fluid loss, temperature fluctuations and infection, and an excretory system that can filter out nitrogenous waste in the form of urea or uric acid, in contrast to the ammonia-based excretion of aquatic animals. Without the buoyancy of an aqueous environment to support their weight, they have evolved robust skeletons that can hold up their body shape, as well as powerful appendages known as legs or limbs to facilitate terrestrial locomotion, although some perform limbless locomotion using body surface projections such as scales and setae. Some terrestrial animals even have wings or membranes that act as airfoils to generate lift, allowing them to fly and/or glide as airborne animals.

Seafood is any form of sea life regarded as food by humans, prominently including fish and shellfish. Shellfish include various species of molluscs (e.g., bivalve molluscs such as clams, oysters, and mussels, and cephalopods such as octopus and squid), crustaceans (e.g. shrimp, crabs, and lobster), and echinoderms (e.g. sea cucumbers and sea urchins). Historically, marine mammals such as cetaceans (whales and dolphins) as well as seals have been eaten as food, though that happens to a lesser extent in modern times. Edible sea plants such as some seaweeds and microalgae are widely eaten as sea vegetables around the world, especially in Asia.

Seafood is an important source of (animal) protein in many diets around the world, especially in coastal areas. Semi-vegetarians who consume seafood as the only source of meat are said to adhere to pescetarianism.

Sea monsters are beings from folklore believed to dwell in the sea and are often imagined to be of immense size. Marine monsters can take many forms, including sea dragons, sea serpents, or tentacled beasts. They can be slimy and scaly and are often pictured threatening ships or spouting jets of water. The definition of a "monster" is subjective; further, some sea monsters may have been based on scientifically accepted creatures, such as whales and types of giant and colossal squid.

Cetaceans (/sɪˈteɪʃə/; from Latin cetus 'whale', from Ancient Greek κῆτος (kêtos) 'huge fish, sea monster') are aquatic mammals belonging to the infraorder Cetacea, in the order Artiodactyla. Cetaceans include whales, dolphins and porpoises. Key characteristics are their fully aquatic lifestyle, streamlined body shape, often large size and exclusively carnivorous diet. They propel themselves through the water with powerful up-and-down movements of their tail, which ends in a paddle-like fluke, using their flipper-shaped forelimbs to steer.

While the majority of cetaceans live in marine environments, a small number reside solely in brackish or fresh water. Having a cosmopolitan distribution, they can be found in some rivers and all of Earth's oceans, and many species migrate throughout vast ranges with the changing of the seasons.

Cetology (from Greek κῆτος, kētos, "whale"; and -λογία, -logia) or whalelore (also known as whaleology) is the branch of marine mammal science that studies the approximately eighty species of whales, dolphins, and porpoises in the scientific infraorder Cetacea. Cetologists, or those who practice cetology, seek to understand and explain cetacean evolution, distribution, morphology, behavior, community dynamics, and other topics.

The Saguenay–St. Lawrence Marine Park is a National Marine Conservation Area, one of three in the Canadian national park system, located where the Saguenay River meets the maritime estuary of the St. Lawrence River. This park is jointly managed by Parks Canada (Government of Canada) and Sépaq (Government of Quebec). It is the first park in all of Canada to protect a purely marine environment, and covers a surface area of 1,245 km. The area that is now the Saguenay–St. Lawrence Marine Park is a part of the Innue Essipit First Nation's land claim, and a treaty resulting from this claim could impact activities that are practiced within the park. The region surrounding the park is an important part of the history of Canada, being one of the first points of contact between Indigenous Peoples and European explorers and the birthplace of the intercontinental fur trade.

The Maritime estuary of St. Lawrence begin at the Saguenay Fjord this meeting form a distinct ecosystem for the species in the park. Different species of whales in particular are drawn to the rich food supply stirred up by the mixing of these waters. One of these species is the St. Lawrence Beluga whale, which is endemic to Canada and a species at risk. The most popular activity in the park is whale-watching. The park provides a variety of opportunities on and off the water for visitors to see them. There are several human impacts that threaten the park such as climate change, noise pollution, chemical pollution, and overfishing, many of which are not fully understood.