Common bleak Common bleak The common bleak ("Alburnus alburnus") is a small freshwater coarse fish of the cyprinid family. The body of the bleak is elongated and flat. The head is pointed and the relatively small mouth is turned upwards. The anal fin is long and has 18 to 23 fin rays. The lateral line is complete. The bleak has a shiny silvery colour; and the fins are pointed and colourless. The maximum length is approximately 25 cm. In Europe the bleak can easily be confused with many other species. In England, young common bream and silver bream can be confused with
Blue whale Naturae" of 1758, would have known this and may have intended the ironic double meaning. Herman Melville called this species "sulphur-bottom" in his novel "Moby-Dick" (1851) due to an orange-brown or yellow tinge on the underparts from diatom films on the skin. Other common names for the blue whale have included "Sibbald's rorqual" (after Sibbald, who first described the species), the "great blue whale" and the "great northern rorqual". These names have now fallen into disuse. The first known usage of the term "blue whale" was in Melville's "Moby-Dick", which only mentions it in passing and does not specifically attribute