Grey Whale neck vertebrae
Pleistocene period 40000 years old Brown Bank, Rotterdam
The Grey Whale (Eschrichtius robustus) is a baleen whale that travels between feeding and breeding grounds yearly. It reaches a length of about 52ft, a weight of 36 tons and an age of 50–60 years.
Grey Whales were once called Devil Fish because of their fighting behavior when hunted.
The Grey Whale is the sole species in the genus Eschrichtius, which in turn is the sole genus in the family Eschrichtiidae. This animal is descended from the filter-feeding whales that developed at the beginning of the Oligocene, over 30 million years before the present.
The Grey Whale is distributed in an eastern North Pacific (American) population and a critically endangered western North Pacific (Asian) population. Eastern and western populations in the North Atlantic became extinct in the 18th century.
This bone is genuine and has no restoration.
