Hey everyone, this is Allie. We are so thrilled to bring you this interview with Dr. Bruce

Mate of the Marine Mammal Institute out on the Oregon Coast. It is one of the absolute leaders

in mammal research and it was such a treat to get to speak to Bruce. He was full of knowledge

and really great with examples and we learned so much from him, from conservation to the size of whales

to their babies, even to poop, thanks to Theo's question. So check it out and we hope you like it.

And don't forget to check out our full episode on Blue Whales, which should be right above or

below this one in your feed.

My name is Bruce Smate.

I direct the Marine Mammal Institute at Oregon State University at the Hatfield Marine

Science Center in Newport, Oregon.

I study whales and I specialized in inventing the way of tracking whales by satellite.

What are the hardest and best parts of being a marine animal researcher?

Well, I think the hardest part's raising the money to get to do it.

If it was easy, everybody would do it.

That's true of most any kind of job.

But we have to raise the money for our salaries and our ship and our time at sea

and logistics and things like that.

So the hardest part's raising money, but the joyous part is that what we find out about

whales makes a difference in their conservation and management.

So we really think we make a big difference.

We can keep them out of harm's way from ships, and plus they're just awesome to be around.

What do you think is the coolest thing about blue whales?

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