Diet and Bubble-Net Feeding: Humpback whales are filter feeders that eat tiny crustaceans, plankton, and small fish (including herring, mackerel, capelin, and sandeel). These social whales sometimes hunt cooperatively; they have developed a method of rounding up highly concentrated masses of prey using a method we call bubble-net feeding. The hunting members of a pod form a large circle and then blow a wall of bubbles as they swim to the surface in a spiral path. The cylindrical wall of bubbles makes the trapped prey swim to the surface, where the whales eat them.

Swimming: Like other whales, Humpbacks swim by moving their tail (called flukes) up and down. Fish swim by moving their tail left and right.