How to Use baleen in a Sentence

baleen

noun
  • Back at the lab, the baleen plates were frozen, cleaned and measured.
    — Jack Tamisiea, Scientific American, 8 Dec. 2021
  • All baleen whales eat tiny krill, crustaceans found in all the world's oceans.
    — David Grossman, Popular Mechanics, 24 May 2017
  • The sei whale is a type of baleen whale and prefers deep offshore waters.
    — Mari A. Schaefer, Philly.com, 27 Apr. 2017
  • But why baleen replaced teeth in the first place is still a bit of an unknown.
    — Megan Schmidt, Discover Magazine, 29 Nov. 2018
  • As the water escapes, krill and small fish are snagged by the baleen’s bristles.
    — Jack Tamisiea, Scientific American, 8 Dec. 2021
  • Of course, today’s baleen whales include some of the largest animals of all time.
    — Brian Switek, Scientific American Blog Network, 14 June 2017
  • Kanayurak uses sea glass, whale bones, ivory pieces and baleen to create her collages.
    — Alena Naiden, Anchorage Daily News, 20 Aug. 2022
  • The whales belonged to six baleen species, with humpbacks making up over two-thirds of sightings.
    — Kaif Shaikh, Interesting Engineering, 13 Aug. 2025
  • Then seemingly overnight, one type of whale — the toothless baleens — became huge.
    — Seth Borenstein, chicagotribune.com, 24 May 2017
  • Then seemingly overnight, one type of whale – the toothless baleens – became huge.
    — Seth Borenstein, The Christian Science Monitor, 24 May 2017
  • Feats like that allowed the giant baleen whales to thrive as the oceans changed while smaller baleen whales went extinct.
    — Jason Daley, Smithsonian, 25 May 2017
  • Krill is sort of a plankton soup – the primary food of humpbacks and other baleen whales.
    — Sacbee, sacbee.com, 11 May 2017
  • In a yard off Stevenson Street, there is a steel pipe with baleen attached to it like palm fronds.
    — Wyatt Williams, Harper's Magazine, 17 Aug. 2021
  • The whales then push out the water and strain the fish through flexible comb-like structures in their mouths called baleen.
    — Sarah Keartes, National Geographic, 30 July 2019
  • Ten million years later, true baleen filter-feeding whales began to emerge.
    — Megan Schmidt, Discover Magazine, 29 Nov. 2018
  • On the wall, a finger of whale baleen hung above a wooden snowshoe and an image of Jesus.
    — Kyle Hopkins, ProPublica, 21 Nov. 2023
  • Worm-snails then filter-feed like baleen whales by pulling the mucus webs back into their mouths and straining the food through barbs on their tongues.
    — National Geographic, 5 Apr. 2017
  • Both toothed and baleen (filter-feeding) whales are among the largest animals ever to exist.
    — Jeremy Goldbogen, The Conversation, 12 Dec. 2019
  • Each specimen was from different baleen species–sei, common minke, and humpback whale.
    — Laura Baisas, Popular Science, 21 Feb. 2024
  • That’s because the large baleen whales became the target of whaling in the 1800s.
    — Hope McKenney, Anchorage Daily News, 19 Feb. 2022
  • These included toothed species (dolphins, porpoises, orcas and sperm whales) that use sonar, and baleen species that don't.
    — Ed Yong, Discover Magazine, 25 Jan. 2010
  • As for the whale’s bristly baleen, these fibers and plates are flexible and resistant to fracture thanks to high levels of keratin.
    — Sarah Keartes, National Geographic, 30 July 2019
  • One of Reed’s daughters fixed the woman a cot to sleep on in the living room, beneath the baleen and dreamcatchers.
    — Kyle Hopkins, ProPublica, 16 May 2019
  • These feed by filtering small organisms such as krill from the water, using hairy plates (made of tissue called baleen) as sieves.
    — The Economist, 26 Oct. 2017
  • The first baleen whales to evolve filter-fed upon plankton—essentially, tiny, drifting sea bugs.
    — Eric M. Keen, Scientific American, 31 July 2020
  • Seram, the largest island in the Maluku Island group, is near the migration routes for baleen whales.
    — Fox News, 15 May 2017
  • The major difference between baleen and toothed whales is their feeding strategy.
    — Joshua Rapp Learn, Discover Magazine, 19 Mar. 2021
  • Humpback whales feed on krill and small fish, and strain huge volumes of water through the baleen plates in their mouths, which act as a filter-feeding system.
    — Emily Deletter, USA TODAY, 11 Apr. 2024
  • Humpbacks are the only species of baleen whales to carry their own offensive and defensive weaponry.
    — Elin Kelsey, Smithsonian, 18 Aug. 2017
  • People harvested the baleen, blubber, bone, meat, oil, and spermaceti.
    — Emilie Le Beau Lucchesi, Discover Magazine, 26 Oct. 2023

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'baleen.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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