Porpoises: Phocoenidae

Porpoises are carnivores, meat eaters. They eat mainly fish. The type of fish they prefer depends on the habitat in which they live. They also eat squid and octopus. Some also eat shrimp and mollusks (hard shelled animals like clams). Many porpoises migrate seasonally in order to follow the fish they feed on. Their natural predators, animals that hunt them for food, are some sharks, killer whales, and bottlenosed dolphins.

Porpoises use echolocation (eck-oh-loh-KAY-shun) to help find food. They make sounds (scientists disagree about how this is done) that are sent out into the environment. When the sounds bounce back, the echo is passed through special tissue in the lower jaw to the inner ear. From the time it takes to collect the echoes, their strength, and their direction, the animal can construct a "sound picture" of its environment. This system is extremely sensitive and allows the animal to locate very small objects.