Description
English: Balaenoptera omurai off northwestern Madagacsar
Date October 2015
Source Royal Society Open Science
Author Salvatore Cerchio et al. / Royal Society Open Science
Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Balaenoptera_omurai,_Madagascar_-_Royal_Society_Open_Science_1.jpg

Omura's whale or the dwarf fin whale (Balaenoptera omurai) is a species of rorqual about which very little is known. Before its formal description, it was referred to as a small, "dwarf" or "pygmy" form of Bryde's whale by various sources. The common name and specific epithet commemorate Japanese cetologist Hideo Omura. Omura's whale appears to be restricted to the shelf and deep waters of tropical and subtropical regions, with records from the eastern Indian Ocean (off Cocos Islands, Thailand, and Malaysia), Borneo and Indonesia, the Philippines, Hong Kong, China, Taiwan, the Sea of Japan, the Seto Inland Sea, the Timor Sea, New Caledonia, Western and South Australia, the Solomon Sea, Madagascar, the Strait of Hormuz, and in the Atlantic ocean from Mauritania and Brazil. Order: Artiodactyla, Infraorder: Cetacea, Family: Balaenopteridae, Genus: Balaenoptera, Species: Balaenoptera omurai Wada et al., 2003.