Narwhal

Lore & Background

The narwhal was scientifically described by Carl Linnaeus in his 1758 publication Systema Naturae. The word 'narwhal' comes from the Old Norse, meaning 'corpse-whale', which possibly refers to the animal's grey, mottled skin and its habit of remaining motionless when at the water's surface, a behaviour known as 'logging' that usually happens in the summer. The scientific name, Monodon monoceros, is derived from Ancient Greek, meaning 'single-tooth single-horn'. The narwhal is most closely related to the beluga whale. Together, these two species comprise the only extant members of the family Monodontidae. There is evidence of interbreeding between the two, with a hybrid known as a 'narluga' confirmed by a 2019 DNA analysis.

In Their Own Story

The ice groaned under the weight of a shifting glacier, but beneath the white expanse, silence reigned. A pod of narwhals moved in unison, their mottled gray bodies ghostly against the dark water. The lead male, his tusk a pale spear cutting through the gloom, paused to sense a sudden drop in salinity—a signal that the ice shelf above was thinning. He emitted a low-frequency click, a sound that traveled miles through the cold currents, gathering his kin before they dove deeper into the abyss where the Greenland halibut waited.

Reader's Guide

Narwhals inhabit the Arctic waters of Canada, Greenland and Russia. Every year, they migrate to ice-free summering grounds, usually in shallow waters, and often return to the same sites in subsequent years. Their diet mainly consists of polar and Arctic cod, Greenland halibut, cuttlefish, shrimp, and armhook squid. Diving to depths of up to 1,500 meters, the narwhal is among the deepest-diving cetaceans. The animals typically travel in groups of three to eight, with aggregations of up to 1,000 occurring in the summer months. Narwhals mate among the offshore pack ice from March to May, and the young are born between July and August of the following year. When communicating amongst themselves, narwhals use a variety of clicks, whistles and knocks. There are an estimated 170,000 living narwhals, and the species is listed as being of least concern by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

Did You Know?

• The narwhal's tusk is a protruding left canine that can reach lengths of up to 2.7 meters.
• Narwhals have specially adapted slow-twitch muscles and jointed neck vertebrae for easy movement through the Arctic environment.
• The narwhal's geographic range overlaps with that of the beluga whale, and the animals are known to interbreed.
• Narwhals have been hunted for thousands of years by Inuit in northern Canada and Greenland for meat and ivory.