Whales, Dolphins, and Porpoises
Cetaceans include baleen whales and toothed whales, from blue whales to orcas and dolphins.
Species · Oceans · Evolution
Marine Mammals
Marine mammals are animals that live in or depend on the ocean while breathing air, nursing their young, and carrying deep evolutionary stories from land back into water.
Species Group
Ocean life with mammal roots.
Marine mammals are not one single branch of the family tree. They are several mammal lineages that returned to the sea in different ways, adapting bodies, senses, social systems, and migration patterns to life in water.
Pinnipeds
Seals, sea lions, fur seals, elephant seals, and walruses are fin-footed marine mammals that move between ocean and shore.
Sirenians
Manatees and dugongs are gentle herbivores connected to seagrass ecosystems and warm coastal waters.
Sea Otters and Polar Bears
Some marine mammals are not fully aquatic, but their lives are deeply tied to ocean food webs.
Adaptations for Ocean Life
Blubber, breath-holding, streamlined bodies, echolocation, migration, and social learning help marine mammals survive in water.
Conservation and Human Relationships
Marine mammals connect to Indigenous knowledge, hunting history, captivity debates, whale watching, pollution, climate change, shipping, fishing gear, and ocean stewardship.