Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon

Physeteridæ — The Cachelots or Sperm Whales

Genus Euphysetes

No. 270. Physeter or EUPHYSETES SIMUS.
The Snub-nosed Cachelot.

Native Name.—Wonga, Telugu.

Habitat.—Bay of Bengal.

Description.—The general form of this animal resembles the porpoise, but the position of the mouth at once distinguishes it. It is small and situated, like that of the shark, considerably under the blunt rostrum, so much so as to lead one to conjecture whether or not it turns on its back in seizing its prey, as do the sharks. The blow hole is crescentic, but eccentrically placed to the left of the middle line of the head, and the horns of the crescent are turned diagonally backwards—that is to say, the lower limb points to the back whilst the upper one touches the middle line and points across; the eye is small; the pectoral fins are triangular, about one foot in length and four and a-half inches broad in the male, and four inches in the female; the dorsal fin is sub-falcate, standing about a foot high, and is nine to ten inches broad at the base, the male being the broader; the colour is a shining black above, paler and pinkish below.

Dentition: 1—1/9—9 = 20.

Size.—Six to seven feet.

The peculiarity of this cetacean is the preponderance of the cranial over the rostral part, more so, as Professor Owen remarks, than in any other species. The asymmetry of the bones too is remarkable, although this is characteristic of all the catodon whales, especially as regards the bones of the anterior narial passages, the left of which is very much larger than the right. This is also the case in the large sperm whale, but in Euphysetes the disproportion is still greater. In a notice on a New Zealand species (E. Pottsii), by Dr. Julius Haast, he gives the difference as fifteen times the size of the right aperture; the mouth is also peculiar from its position and small size, being very much overshot by the snout. It may, as Dr. Haast supposes, be a ground feeder, existing on the smaller hydroid zoophytes, otherwise it must, I think, turn on its side in seizing its prey.