Jenny Morber (@JRMorber) provides us with the delightfully vivid description of whale excrement we never knew we needed in her recent story for Slate. She discusses new research suggesting that baleen whales defecate much more than previously thought — great news for the marine organisms that use cetacean excreta as a critical source of micronutrients, and for the planet, since those organisms can store lots of carbon. And, the scat — which can range from neon yellow to dark red, from mildly scented to abhorrent — provides scientists with a rich source of biological data revealing what whales are up to and how they’re feeling. Photo by Andrea Holien via Wikimedia Commons
