Giant baleen whales emerged from a cold southern cradle

Abstract

Baleen whales (mysticetes) include the largest animals on the Earth. How they achieved such gigantic sizes remains debated, with previous research focusing primarily on when mysticetes became large, rather than where. Here, we describe an edentulous baleen whale fossil (21.12–16.39 mega annum (Ma)) from South Australia. With an estimated body length of 9 m, it is the largest mysticete from the Early Miocene. Analysing body size through time shows that ancient baleen whales from the Southern Hemisphere were larger than their northern counterparts. This pattern seemingly persists for much of the Cenozoic, even though southern specimens contribute only 19% to the global mysticete fossil record. Our findings contrast with previous ideas of a single abrupt shift towards larger size during the Plio-Pleistocene, which we here interpret as a glacially driven Northern Hemisphere phenomenon. Our results highlight the importance of incorporating Southern Hemisphere fossils into macroevolutionary patterns, especially in light of the high productivity of Southern Ocean environments.

Biogeography and History of the Prehuman Native Mammal Fauna of the New Zealand Region

“…Hence the Southern Ocean has been a rich feeding ground for cold-adapted marine mammals for much longer than has the Arctic, which began to freeze less than 5 million years ago. The evolution of huge baleen whales has been continuing in their "cold southern cradle" for at least 20 million years [36].…”