What is "fin whale"

Fin \Fin\, n.[OE. finne, fin, AS. finn; akin to D. vin, G. & Dan. finne, Sw. fena, L. pinna, penna, a wing, feather. Cf. pen a feather.]

1. (Zo["o]l.) An organ of a fish, consisting of a membrane supported by rays, or little bony or cartilaginous ossicles, and serving to balance and propel it in the water.

   Note: Fishes move through the water chiefly by means of the caudal fin or tail, the principal office of the other fins being to balance or direct the body, though they are also, to a certain extent, employed in producing motion.

2. (Zo["o]l.) A membranous, finlike, swimming organ, as in pteropod and heteropod mollusks.

3. A finlike organ or attachment; a part of an object or product which protrudes like a fin, as:

   1. The hand. [Slang]

   2. (Com.) A blade of whalebone. [Eng.]
      --McElrath.

   3. (Mech.) A mark or ridge left on a casting at the junction of the parts of a mold.

   4. (Mech.) The thin sheet of metal squeezed out between the collars of the rolls in the process of rolling.
      --Raymond.

   5. (Mech.) A feather; a spline.

4. A finlike appendage, as to submarine boats.

5. (A["e]ronautics) A fixed stabilizing surface, usually vertical, similar in purpose to a bilge keel on a ship.

   Apidose fin. (Zo["o]l.) See under Adipose, a.

   Fin ray (Anat.), one of the hornlike, cartilaginous, or bony, dermal rods which form the skeleton of the fins of fishes.

   Fin whale (Zo["o]l.), a finback.

   Paired fins (Zo["o]l.), the pectoral and ventral fins, corresponding to the fore and hind legs of the higher animals.

   Unpaired fins, or Median fins (Zo["o]l.), the dorsal, caudal, and anal fins.

n. a whale of the rorqual family (''Balaenoptera physalus'')

n. large flat-headed whalebone whale having deep furrows along the throat; of Atlantic and Pacific [syn: finback, finback whale, common rorqual, Balaenoptera physalus]

The fin whale (Balaenoptera physalus), also called the finback whale, razorback, or common rorqual, is a marine mammal belonging to the suborder of baleen whales. It is the second-largest animal after the blue whale. The largest reportedly grow to long with a maximum confirmed length of 25.9 m (85 ft), a maximum recorded weight of nearly , and a maximum estimated weight of around 120 tonnes (132.5 tons). American naturalist Roy Chapman Andrews called the fin whale "the greyhound of the sea... for its beautiful, slender body is built like a racing yacht and the animal can surpass the speed of the fastest ocean steamship."

The fin whale's body is long and slender, coloured brownish-grey with a paler underside.The fin whale is a large baleen whale that belongs to the cetacean order, which is composed of all species of whale, dolphin and porpoise. At least two recognized subspecies exist, in the North Atlantic and the Southern Hemisphere. It is found in all the major oceans, from polar to tropical waters. It is absent only from waters close to the ice pack at the poles and relatively small areas of water away from the open ocean. The highest population density occurs in temperate and cool waters. Its food consists of small schooling fish, squid, and crustaceans including copepods and krill.

Like all other large whales, the fin whale was heavily hunted during the 20th century and is an endangered species. Over 725,000 fin whales were reportedly taken from the Southern Hemisphere between 1905 and 1976, as of 1997 survived by only 38,000.

The International Whaling Commission (IWC) issued a moratorium on commercial hunting of this whale, although Iceland and Japan have resumed hunting. The species is also hunted by Greenlanders under the IWC's Aboriginal Subsistence Whaling provisions. Global population estimates range from less than 100,000 to roughly 119,000.