Thousands of species of animals have disappeared due to human activities. Some were destroyed because their meat, fat, and hides were used to meet their normal needs, others because of reduced habitat. If we began to forget what bluffing is, then humanity has provided a chance for survival for many marine animals, whose fat has long been the main source of raw materials for the production of lubricants, soap and margarine.
Etymology
The meaning of the word "blubber" is simple: in the XVI-XIX centuries, the so-called liquid fat, which was obtained from the subcutaneous fat of marine animals. The word comes from the ancient Swedish and Danish names of the whale - narhval / narval. Raven is extracted from mammals: mainly from various species of whales, as well as seals, walruses, belugas and dolphins, and even polar bears and fish. The term is outdated and almost never used. Now fats are divided according to the source of origin - for example, cetacean, cod and seal.
In ancient Russia (XV-XVI centuries), the word "blubber" was used to refer to whale skins and lard, and later - the skins of marine mammals, including seals.
Sources
In all marine mammals (cetaceans, pinnipeds and sirens), under the skin there is a thick layer of fat covering the entire body except for the extremities. In some animals, its mass can reach half of the total. Fat-containing subcutaneous tissue serves to protect the mammal from hypothermia, in addition, increases the streamlining of the body contour and increases buoyancy. Species of animals that make long migrations (such as the humpback whale), while swimming to new habitats, live off the reserves of this fat.
The blubber, which is obtained from marine inhabitants, has a brown or yellowish color and a very unpleasant odor. Basically it was reared from whales caught in the Arctic and Antarctic. They were hunted in spring and summer when they are well-fed and have a lot of fat. A blue whale can produce about 19,080 liters of fat, and a sperm whale - 7950 liters.
Using
What is a blubber, many townsfolk learned from the fascinating novels of writers of the XVIII-XIX centuries about whaling. Then, whale oil was the main source satisfying all the needs of the population for fatty acids.
Fat was used for lighting in lamps and fixtures, until the 1960s it served as the basis for the production of lubricants for automobiles and submarines, as well as a tool for treating leather and suede and in many other production processes. Also, a lot of whale oil was used in the manufacture of soap, margarine and in the chemical industry.