ORBIT OF THE BOWHEAD WHALE, BAIAENA MYSTICETUS

The orbit of the the whale is quite modiffied, shows much more variation in comparison to that of the better studied mammals, and is composed of the maxillary bone, lacrimal bone,frontal bone, temporal bone, zygomatic bone, parietal bone and sphenoid bone. The whale's eyeball usually protrudes beyond the bony otbital rim, based on the oborvation of this study. Our observation in this study that the whale has an enclosed orbit differs from that of Prince (1956), who mentioned that the whale has an open othit.