📸 PhotoPhoto: ori2uru · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons Source
East Asian Finless Porpoise
Neophocaena sunameri (East Asian Finless Porpoise · East Asian Finless Porpoise)
Not Evaluated (NE) on the IUCN Red List yet.
🇰🇷 Marine Protected Species (Korea)
💡 Everyday Comparisons for Size, Mass & Speed
- 💡 A maximum body length of about 2.3 m is about 1.3 times the height of a 1.7 m adult human (Comparison).
- 💡 A maximum weight of about 72 kg is slightly heavier than an adult human (about 60 kg) (Comparison).
Reference standards: coach bus ~12 m, mid-size car ~4.9 m, compact car ~1 t, basketball hoop 3.05 m, credit card 8.56 cm.
Site-computed relative index from recorded values; not a formal scientific metric.
📖 1. Overview
The East Asian Finless Porpoise is a small cetacean lacking a dorsal fin that lives in shallow coastal waters of East Asia.
🦴 2. Anatomy & Morphology
Instead of a dorsal fin, it has a low ridge running along its back covered with small tubercles. Its body color is paler than that of its Southeast Asian relative, the Indo-Pacific finless porpoise.
🔍 3. Ecology & Behavior
It feeds on fish, cephalopods, and shrimp. It reaches maturity at about 3–6 years of age, has a gestation period of 10–11 months, and is known to live up to 33 years.
🇰🇷 4. Connection to Korea
As the marine subspecies within Neophocaena asiaeorientalis, it inhabits shallow seas of Japan, Korea, China, and Taiwan.
📚 Sources & References
- • 해양보호생물 — 국가생물종목록(국립생물자원관) ktsn 120000209297 — https://species.nibr.go.kr/home/mainHome.do?cont_link=009&subMenu=009002&contCd=009002&ktsn=120000209297
- • IUCN Red List: not evaluated (NE) — cross-checked with the Wikidata conservation-status entry
- • Korean protection status: Marine Protected Species (Korea)
- • mammaldiversity.org — 1006448
- • 국가생물종목록(국립생물자원관) ktsn 120000209297 — https://species.nibr.go.kr/home/mainHome.do?cont_link=009&subMenu=009002&contCd=009002&ktsn=120000209297
- • wikidata.org — Q108457190
- • doi.org — zenodo.6607561
- • doi.org — zenodo.6607333
- • Silhouette: PhyloPic — author not recorded · CC0 1.0 (Congeneric silhouette — Neophocaena asiaeorientalis)
Recorded dimensions are widely cited representative estimates from public literature and may vary by study or specimen.