Blue whales, it turns out, are a tad ambidextrous.
When hunting in deep water, the whales tend to be “right-handed,” lunging at krill while twisting 180 degrees or less onto their right side. But when gobbling up the tiny crustaceans near the surface, the whales tend to be lefties, launching themselves upward while performing a 360-degree barrel roll to the left, researchers report in the Nov. 20 Current Biology. Rolling to the left at the surface may help the whales better see food with their dominant right eye, the scientists say.