If sea mammal like whale is breathing actual air and actually is just holding their breath while under water, why is it necessary for them to live in sea?
In: Biology
A whale is too massive to be on land, the crush themselves. Also they could need feed themselves. Other smaller animals like seals could stay on land a while but still need the ocean to feed.
Disclaimer: not a biologist
So for whales at least, they’re too heavy to live on land. And it’s much more difficult to get the food required to support that much body mass on land rather than in the sea.
I believe for animals such as seals that live in colder climates, the ocean is a good source of food year round.
Thank you everyone. I have found my answer 😁
I’m not sure why the question follows from your premise.
Marine mammals breathe air because they evolved from land-dwelling animals, and also because breathing air is a really good way to get oxygen, especially for a warm-blooded animal, and there is no plausible evolutionary path back to gills anyway.
They live in the sea because this is the niche they spread out to. Asking “why do they live in the sea” is kind of like asking why giraffes live on land – it’s a tautology because they evolved for that niche.
Whales dolphin etc live at sea because that is where they find food.
Over time they evolved to better and better adapted to live in the sea and became less and less well adapted to live on land. Today they could not live on land at all for any amount of time.
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