Why the Ocean Is So Salty

Netlore Archive: Is it true that a blue whale produces over 400 gallons of sperm when it ejaculates, and that explains the saltiness of the ocean?

Description: Email hoax / Joke
Text circulating since: Oct 2002
Image circulating since: June 2003
Status: False

(Warning: Message below contains "anatomically correct" photo of a gigantic sea creature)

Email example contributed by Duane G., 17 June 2003:

OH MY GOD!!!! FW: Don't drink the sea water... read below first.... The average blue whale produces over 400 gallons of sperm when it ejaculates, but only 10% of that actually makes it into his mate. So 360 gallons are spilled into the ocean every time one unloads, and you wonder why the ocean is so salty... Click to Enlarge

Comments: This is a two-part hoax, the text having first appeared as a "Fact of the Day" on email joke lists toward the end of 2002. The attached image is of unknown origin and didn't begin circulating until June 2003.

It should be obvious at first glance that the text and image don't belong together. How could the relatively small "whale" specimen in this photograph possibly produce 400 gallons of sperm at a go? By way of comparison, the capacity of an average hot tub is roughly that same amount, 400 gallons, meaning that this poor creature would have to possess testicles twice the size of the rest of its body to live up to its glandular reputation.

A question of testicular capacity

It does stand to reason that since blue whales are the largest animals on the planet, their reproductive organs should be of similarly impressive dimensions, and that is certainly the case: by one estimate, the penis of a blue whale can measure up to 16 feet long and its testicles weigh in at around 25 pounds apiece. But even packing 50 pounds of bollocks -- the weight of an average-sized bulldog, if you need a benchmark -- it's absurd to imagine that a blue whale, or any other creature on earth for that matter, could produce 400 gallons of seminal fluid, or even one-tenth that amount, at a time. (For yet another comparison, I found one source stating that the southern right whale -- which has testicles even larger than the blue whale's, weighing in a half-a-ton apiece -- produces around 5 gallons of ejaculate in a single mating session.) The statistic is simply bogus.

Whale or whale shark?

Then there is the question of whether or not the animal depicted in this photo is even a blue whale at all, which it appears it is not. Blue whales average at least 75 feet in length. Using the human beings in the photograph for scale, this creature is clearly smaller than a blue whale and most likely isn't any kind of whale at all, but rather a whale shark.

And since sharks don't have penises per se, we must further conclude that either this image has been doctored (though I could detect no obvious signs of that), or the spectacular appendage dangling between the animal's pelvic fins is one of its claspers, a pair of tubular organs with which a male shark fastens itself to the female and inseminates her during reproduction.

To sum up:

1. Blue whales can't possibly ejaculate 400 gallons of sperm -- the capacity of an average hot tub -- not even close.
2. The animal in the photo isn't a blue whale in the first place, nor is the circled appendage its penis.
3. There are no doubt good reasons to avoid making a habit of drinking sea water, but sperm spillover isn't one of them.
4. Which is more than can be said for hot tub water.

Bonus question:

Is It True that a Whale Penis Is Called a 'Dork'?
Urban Legends Blog, 7 July 2007

Sources and further reading:

Is It True the the Blue Whale Ejaculates 400 Gallons of Sperm?
Ask the Researcher! (Whales Online, 14 April 2003)

Whale Reproduction
Whales Online

How Big Is a Blue Whale's Penis/Testicles?
Ask a Scientist (WhaleNet, 20 March 1997)

Did You Know?
Sydney Morning Herald, 30 July 2002

In Pursuit of Giants
Sunday Times (South Africa), 22 Sep. 2002

Is a Whale Shark a Whale or a Shark?
North Carolina Aquarium Society

Shark Reproduction
Canadian Shark Research Laboratory

Last updated: 07/07/03

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