Forest City press. (Forest City, Potter County, D.T. [S.D.]) 1883-19??, 1916-06-21
WHALE FLESH WOULD
REDUCE LIVING COST

Washington, June Eff the Amer
lean and Eur opean people could be ed
ucated to the point of eating the
canned flesh of animals which individ-
ually yield as much as $4,000 pounds
of meat, what a wonderful food supply
would be within reach of the poor of
our great cities" writes Roy Chapman
Andrews, of New York, in AN interest
ing communication on whaling to the
National Geographic society. He pre-
diets that as a result of the world hum
for the of the seas, now go
ing on in full blast, the commercial
extinction of the large whales, within
a very few decades, Is inevitable. EN-
of the flesh of the animals which is
palatable and healthful. is now going
to waste, or is being used for fertiliz-
ing purposes.
Largest Animal Known.
Few people realize that the blue or
sulphur bottom whale found in all our
oceans is not only the largest animal
that lives today, but is also, so far as
is known, the largest animal that has
ever existed on the earth or in its
waterS,' writes MIR. Andrews. "Speci-
mems have been measured which
reached u length of 81 feet and in all
probability weighed as much as 10
large enough in fact to permit 10 or
~ men to stand upright in it, the
throat measures only nine inches in
diameter. These animals, like most of
the 'whalebOne whales usually feed on
minute crustaceans, n shrimp about
three-quarters of an inch long. They
probably never eat fish of any kind, il
other food is to. be had, and of the
many stomach j have examined, never
once could anything but the little red
c~rustaceans be found. From the stom-
ach of one blue whale at Vancouver
island five barrels of shrimp We're
taken. n it was by no means full.
~"Probably no cetacean has such Won
derful strength as have the blue
whales: When l saw a blue hale with
a harpoon between the shoulders drag
a ship, with engines at full speed
aste1n, through the water almost as il
1T had been a roWboat, | began to lis
ten to the stories of their incredible
strength with more respect. The fin
back. closely related to the blue whale,
has been called the greyhound of the
sea- fcr it's long. slender body is built
on the lines of the racing yacht, and
the animal can equal the speed of tue
fastest steamship.
Great Affection fer Young.
"All the large whales show great af-
lection for their young, and the COWS
and calves will seldom leave each other
when pursued by a ship. | remember
at one time in Alaska we sighted q
female fnback with a young one about
80 feet long beside her. AS the old
whale rose to spout the gunner fired,
killing her almost instantly. The calf,
although badly frightened, continued
to swim in a circle about the ship, and
finally, when its dead mother had been
hoisted to the surface, the little fellow
came alongside so close that j could
have struck him with a stone. During
the time that the carcass was being
inflated and the gun reloaded, the calf
was constantly within a few fatloms
of the ship. swimming around and
around, sometimes rubbing Itself
against the body of its dead mother.
Finally Il harpoon was sent crashing
into it's size. and it sank without 4
struggle.
IN the upper portion of the head of
the sperm whale is an immense oil
tank in which the valuable 'sperma-
ceti' is found in a liquid condition and
from which it m n be dipped with a
bucket when an i~ncision is made. From
a sperm whale 60 feet in length, which
was sent from Japan, 20 barrels OF
spermaceti We're taken out of the case
and the surrounding fat. The sperm
whale is the animal which yields am
bergris, the valuable substance useG
so extensively in he manufacture OF
our best perfumes"