MythscribeMundus
THE NATURAL & IMAGINED WORLDAn illustrated compendium
mythscribe.cloudSearch/
NATURAL HISTORY · CATALOGUE RECORD

Blainville's Beaked Whale

Mesoplodon densirostris (Blainville, 1817)

Source-backed taxonomic record

Accepted species in Catalogue of Life’s 11 September 2026 base release. This preserves the source classification and available supporting data; it is not a completed species monograph.

This W3C-unspecified vector image was created with Inkscape .Size comparison of an average human and a Blainville's beaked whale

This W3C-unspecified vector image was created with Inkscape .Size comparison of an average human and a Blainville's beaked whale

Chris huh · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Image source

Provider-generated thumbnail requested at 800 pixels; no local editing Local WebP display rendition; resized without cropping.

Open encyclopedia reference

Blainville's beaked whale (Mesoplodon densirostris), or the dense-beaked whale, is believed to be the widest ranging mesoplodont whale. The French zoologist Henri de Blainville first described the species in 1817 from a small piece of jaw—the heaviest bone he had ever come across—which resulted in the name densirostris (Latin for "dense beak"). Off the northeastern Bahamas, the animals are particularly well documented, and a photo identification project started sometime after 2002.

Wikipedia contributors, Blainville's beaked whale; see linked history · CC BY-SA 4.0 . Plain-text lead excerpt, at most 180 words; no infobox or later sections Retrieved 2026-10-05T11:01:38.685774+00:00. This reference remains separate from the taxonomic record.

Identity & source status

Scientific name
Mesoplodon densirostris (Blainville, 1817)
Name authority
(Blainville, 1817)
Common name
Blainville's Beaked Whale
Rank
species
Accepted status
accepted
Kingdom
Animalia
Phylum
Chordata
Class
Mammalia
Order
Cetacea
Family
Hyperoodontidae
Genus
Mesoplodon
Extinction status
Recorded extant

Classification family tree

Nested taxonomic groups from the source. This is not a direct-ancestor chain, a dated evolutionary tree or a phylogenetic reconstruction.

  1. domainEukaryota (Chatton, 1925) Whittaker & Margulis, 1978
  2. kingdomAnimalia
  3. phylumChordata
  4. subphylumVertebrata
  5. infraphylumGnathostomata
  6. parvphylumOsteichthyes
  7. megaclassTetrapoda
  8. classMammalia Linnaeus, 1758
  9. subclassTheria Parker & Haswell, 1897
  10. infraclassEutheria Gill, 1872
  11. orderCetacea Brisson, 1762
  12. suborderOdontoceti Flower, 1867
  13. familyHyperoodontidae Gray, 1846
  14. genusMesoplodon Gervais, 1850
  15. speciesMesoplodon densirostris (Blainville, 1817)

Close classified relatives

These entries share the source’s genus, Mesoplodon. They are not necessarily the closest relatives established by molecular evidence.

SpeciesClassificationSource status
North Atlantic beaked whaleMesoplodon bidens (Sowerby, 1804)HyperoodontidaeChordataAccepted speciesRecorded extant
Hubbs' Beaked WhaleMesoplodon carlhubbsi Moore, 1963HyperoodontidaeChordataAccepted speciesRecorded extant
Ginkgo-toothed Beaked WhaleMesoplodon ginkgodens Nishiwaki & Kamiya, 1958HyperoodontidaeChordataAccepted speciesRecorded extant
Gray's Beaked WhaleMesoplodon grayi von Haast, 1876HyperoodontidaeChordataAccepted speciesRecorded extant
Hector's Beaked WhaleMesoplodon hectori (Gray, 1871)HyperoodontidaeChordataAccepted speciesRecorded extant
Deraniyagala's Beaked WhaleMesoplodon hotaula Deraniyagala, 1963HyperoodontidaeChordataAccepted speciesRecorded extant
Bering Sea beaked whaleMesoplodon stejnegeri True, 1885HyperoodontidaeChordataAccepted speciesRecorded extant
Ramari's beaked whaleMesoplodon eueu Carroll, McGowen, McCarthy, Marx, Aguilar, Dalebout, Dreyer, Gaggiotti, Hansen et al., 2021HyperoodontidaeChordataAccepted speciesRecorded extant
Antillean beaked whaleMesoplodon europaeus (Gervais, 1855)HyperoodontidaeChordataAccepted speciesRecorded extant
Layard's beaked whaleMesoplodon layardii (Gray, 1865)HyperoodontidaeChordataAccepted speciesRecorded extant
True's Beaked WhaleMesoplodon mirus True, 1913HyperoodontidaeChordataAccepted speciesRecorded extant
Perrin's Beaked WhaleMesoplodon perrini Dalebout, Mead, Baker, Baker & van Helden, 2002HyperoodontidaeChordataAccepted speciesRecorded extant

Browse 20 records assigned to Hyperoodontidae.

Names & synonyms

Names explicitly linked to this accepted taxon in the source. Synonymy can change with revision.

Recorded nameSource status
Delphinus densirostris Blainville, 1817 Blainville, 1817synonym
Ziphius sechellensis Gray, 1846 Gray, 1846synonym

Documented distribution

Source distribution statements, not a complete range map. A listed locality is not necessarily a place of origin.

East Pacific

Eastern Atlantic Ocean

Indo-West Pacific

Western Atlantic Ocean

Source literature & publication evidence

References attached to this source record, including nomenclatural citations where supplied. This is a selected bibliography; abbreviated citations remain in the source’s form.

  1. https://www.itis.gov/servlet/SingleRpt/SingleRpt?search_topic=TSN&search_value=180517 Source fields: Taxon.tsv dwc:namePublishedIn, Taxon.tsv dcterms:references

Origins, evidence & remaining research

Name authority and publication references document nomenclature where the source supplies it. They do not establish evolutionary origins or the earliest fossil occurrence.

Specimen-level evidence, morphology, ecological research, phylogenetic studies, a comprehensive bibliography and a located literary passage have not yet been compiled for this record.

Dataset citation & attribution

This exact taxon in ChecklistBank · Catalogue of Life 2026-09-11

Catalogue of Life 2026-09-11; dataset 316321; doi:10.48580/dgz5n. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . Retrieved 5 October 2026.

Stable key: col:4256C. Classification follows source parent identifiers. English common names may vary by region.