These things can tell us about the evolutionary history of whales. 'For instance, humpback whales are filter feeders, meaning they have hundreds of plates of baleen in their mouth instead of teeth.

The “incredible moment” showed a humpback whale’s fluke piercing ... straining huge amounts of water on their baleen plates, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, they almost exclusively eat krill, which they strain out of huge water gulps through baleen plates. Humpback whales are filter ...

A humpback whale cruised incognito alongside ... which are shrimp-like crustaceans they eat by straining water through bristly baleen plates made of keratin that act like a sieve.