Baleen this issue. A whale's baleen plates play the most important role in its filter-feeding process. To feed, a baleen whale opens its mouth widely and scoops in dense shoals of prey (such as krill, copepods, small fish, and sometimes birds that happen to be near the shoals), together with large volumes of water. It then partly shuts its mouth and presses its tongue against its upper jaw, forcing the water to pass out sideways through the baleen, thus sieving out the prey, which it then swallows. People formerly used baleen (usually referred to as "whalebone") for making numerous items where
Whale conservation certain other species of high intelligence: humans, other great apes, bottlenose dolphins and elephants. There is an argument that whales should not be killed because of their high intelligence. Pro-whalers claim that pigs also possess high intelligence, and are routinely butchered and eaten, and that intelligence should not be the determining factor of whether an animal is acceptable to eat or not. Whale meat products from certain species have been shown to contain pollutants such as PCBs, mercury, and dioxins. Levels of pollutants in toothed-whale products are significantly higher than those of baleen whales, reflecting the fact that toothed whales