What Do Whales Feel Reading Answers: IELTS Reading Practice Test

 What Do Whales Feel Reading Passage

Paragraph A 

Some senses in cetaceans are reduced or absent or don't work in water, but we and other terrestrial mammals take these for granted. For example, toothed species are unable to smell, which is evident from their brain structure. On the other hand, Baleen species have some similar brain structures, but whether these are functional is not understood. As the blowholes evolved and migrated to the top of the head, it has been speculated that nearly all of the neural pathways serving a sense of smell were sacrificed. The nerves serving these have degenerated or are rudimentary, even though some cetaceans have taste buds. 

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The sense of touch has been sometimes reported to be weak too, but it is mostly mistaken. Trainers comment on their captive dolphins and small whales' responsiveness to touching or rubbing. Free-ranging and captive cetacean individuals of all species (particularly adults and calves or members of the same subgroup) appear to make frequent contact. Stroking or touching are part of the courtship ritual in most species and this contact may help to maintain order within a group. Captive animals often object to being touched around the area of the blowhole as it is sensitive there.

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The sense of vision is developed in different species to different degrees. Baleen species, specifically a grey whale calf, studied in captivity at close quarters underwater for a year, and humpback whales and free-ranging right whales, studied and filmed off Argentina and Hawaii, have tracked objects with vision underwater, and they can see to a certain extent both in water and in air. However, the position of the eyes limits the field of vision in baleen whales that do not have stereoscopic vision. 

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The position of the eyes in most dolphins and porpoises, on the other hand, indicates that they have stereoscopic vision that is downward and forward. The eye position in freshwater dolphins, which often swim upside down or on their side while feeding, suggests that the vision they have is stereoscopic, upward and forward. In comparison, the bottlenose dolphin has extremely keen eyesight in water. Judging from the way it tracks and watches the flying fish, it can also see well through the air-water interface as well. Even though the initial experimental evidence indicates that their vision in air is low, the precision with which dolphins spring high to catch small fish out of a trainer’s hand gives anecdotal evidence to the contrary. 

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With no doubt these variations can be explained with reference to the habitats in which individual species have grown. For example, to species inhabiting clear open waters, vision is more useful than to those living in turbid rivers and flooded plains. For instance, the Chinese beiji and South Americans but appear to have very limited sight, and the Indian susus are blind, their eyes reduced to slits that mostly allow them to recognise only the intensity of light and direction. 

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Even though the sense of taste and smell appear to have declined, and vision in water appears to be unknown, such shortcomings are compensated for by cetaceans’ well-developed auditory sense. Most species are highly vocal, although they vary in the range of voice they generate, and many hunt their prey using echolocation. Primarily, large baleen whales use lower frequencies and are often restricted in their repertoire. The complex, haunting utterances of the humpback whales and the song-like choruses of bowhead whales in summer are notable exceptions. Toothed species in general, produce a wider variety of sounds and more frequency spectrum than baleen species (though the sperm whale apparently produces a monotonous series of high-energy clicks and little else). A few of the complicated sounds are also clearly communicative. The role they play in the ‘culture’ and social life of cetaceans has been more of a wild speculation than of solid science.

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