Life in the slowest lane: Feeding allometry lowers metabolic rate scaling in the largest whales

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Biologging reveals that lunge feeding lowers metabolic rate in large baleen whales, suggesting unique energetic advantages.

Lunge feeding in rorquals lowers their metabolic rate compared to predictions from smaller marine mammals.
Field metabolic rates measured in foraging rorquals were less than half of prey consumption estimates.
Larger whales benefit from a relative cost reduction in foraging due to extended filtering time.
The evolution of lunge feeding may have enabled the growth of the largest body sizes among filter feeders.

Blawas et al. (2025) studied this question.

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