Quirks and Quarks

Can whales smell through their blowholes? Quirks Question

Dr. Debrah Giles answers this week's Quirks Question about whether whales smell.
A humpback whale breaching, and another in the foreground coming up for air. (Submitted by Michael Winsor Photography)

This week's Quirks Question comes to us from Chris Spanis in Kamloops, BC, who asks: 

"Do whales have an olfactory system? Can they smell odours with their blowhole?"

To answer this question, we reached Dr. Deborah Giles, Research Director at the Center for Whale Research

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