Yangtze River Dolphin

Yangtze River dolphin is under the state first-class protection. It is fusiform shaped with a long mouth. It has been living on the Earth for about 25 million years. Yangtze River dolphin is a endotherm (a warm-blooded animal) which breathe with lungs. It is praised as "Panda in Yangtze River". It is on the verge of extinction now.

Yangtze River Dolphin - Morphological Characters

Normally, an adult Yangtze River dolphin is about 2 meters long and weights about 100-200 kilograms. It has long and narrow mouth which is about 30 centimeters long. It has about 130 teeth in its upper and lower jaws. It has round shaped and humped forehead. It has sleek and smooth skin. The back of Yangtze River dolphin is grayish blue and its abdomen is white. Its spiracle is on the upper left top of its head. It has very small degenerated eyes back the corners of its mouth. The weight of its head takes 0.5 percent of its total body weight.

Yangtze River dolphin is timid by nature. It is always far away from the ships since it is easily get frightened. The research for wild Yangtze River dolphin is restricted since it is hard to get close to them, the number of Yangtze River dolphin is very small and their activity area is pretty large.

Yangtze River Dolphin - Geographical Distribution

Yangtze River dolphin mainly lives in the lower reaches of Yangtze River and other water areas connected with Yangtze River (such as Dongting Lake, Poyang Lake and Qiantang River). It would like to play in deep and rapid water.

Due to the influence caused by human activity, the number of Yangtze River dolphin and its geographical distribution is reducing. 92 percent of the death of Yangtze River dolphin was caused by human activity among the specimens collected in 20th century. There were no Yangtze River dolphin in Dongting Lake and Poyang Lake.

According to several observations between 2000 and 2004, Yangtze River dolphin is mainly distributed in the reach of Dongting Lake to Tongling. The latest and last discovery of Yangtze River dolphin was in 2004 - a stranded body of Yangtze River dolphin was found in Nanjing session of Yangtze River.

Yangtze River Dolphin – Living Habits

Yangtze River dolphin is a typical gregarious animal. It is always like to together with its partners (they usually make a group of 2-16 dolphins). It will stay in a certain water area for a period and migrate to another water area when the temperature here is not suitable for him since it has a high demand for temperature of water. Its body temperature is always around 36 ℃.

Yangtze River dolphin feed on small fishes. It likes to live and play in deep and rapid water area, but it always swim to the shoal water area for food. It never uses its teeth and always swallows the fish directly since it has a really good digestion.