Blue whales are the world’s largest baleen whale, the world’s largest mammal, the world’s largest animal, the world’s largest predator, and experts believe the largest living creature to have ever breathed on our planet. Scientists and oceanographers are constantly conducting research on them in an attempt to aid the survival of this magnificent creature.

There are nine distinct populations of blue whales in the world. The eastern North Pacific blue whale population estimated at just over 2,000 represents the largest remaining population of blue whales on earth. They can be seen off the coast of California and migrate north to south and back each year. Until recent times one of the greatest mysteries of the sea was where these types of baleen whales are born? The best way to protect them is to find out where they breed and learn what they will find during their migration.

In California, blue whales are often seen in pairs. The scientists attach tags to the lead animals, since they are suspected to be female and can track them during the winter migration south. These satellite tags lead researchers to their calving sites somewhere in the tropics. One such spot of choice for the Eastern North Pacific Blue Whale is the Costa Rica Dome.

The Costa Rica Dome is a phenomenon of wind and currents. It is a thousand square kilometers of open sea where cold water from the depths rises to just below the warm tropical surface. Wind and currents push warm water aside to allow cold, nutrient-rich water to rise. The boundary between these temperatures represents the shape of a dome. Its position changes from year to year and is constantly moving. The combination of warm and cold water creates the perfect habitat for these magnificent whales.

Cold water is usually rich in nutrients with plankton and krill making up almost all of the blue whale’s diet. It takes about a metric ton of krill to fill a blue whale’s stomach and they can devour three and a half tons of these small shrimp-like crustaceans every day.

The Costa Rica Dome offers more than food for these giants of the ocean. Tropical water acts as an aquatic cradle for many of the young of other fish species. In such an environment, the combination of comfort and an abundant food supply lends itself to making a good nursery for whales.

Blue whales take weeks to reach the Costa Rica Dome after leaving California waters. Pregnant females reach the end of their last trimester. After seven months, the blue whale fetus is four meters long. For the next few months, baby blue will grow an inch each day.

Blue whale experts suggest these babies are born sometime in January. The birth of a Baby Blue must occur very quickly just below the ocean’s surface. A newborn whale would emerge back first. The rapid clotting of the whales’ blood inhibits bleeding, as this would attract predators. Whales are mammals. They are warm-blooded, have lungs instead of gills, and breathe air. A baby should be able to swim to the surface moments after birth.

Blue whale babies are the largest babies in the history of life on earth. They nurse for about seven months feeding their young with milk until they double in size. Their milk is very rich and has forty percent fat. The calves drink almost two hundred liters of milk and each gain more than one hundred kilograms per day.

It is time for the migration north and the mother will take her calf to the krill beds. The mother swims below allowing the baby to rest near the surface. Blue whales struggle to become adults and take ten years to reach full maturity.

During their northward migration, they will swim from tranquility to danger. Some of the densest areas that blue whales use and return each summer to feed intersect with areas of increasing shipping traffic. This is the recipe for whale disaster. Ship strikes pose the biggest threats to baby blue whales, and research by dedicated scientists offers the best hope for new shipping routes that will give the whales the space they need.