A Stunning Photo That Captures a Pod of Sleeping Sperm Whales as They Float in the Caribbean Sea

Swiss wildlife photographer Franco Banfi has captured an absolutely stunning photo of a tired pod of sperm whales fast asleep while floating in the Caribbean Sea off the coast of Dominica. Because of the minimal amount of time that sperm whales spend at rest, this is indeed a rather rare photo as well.

In 2008 a team of researchers suggest that, unlike other cetaceans, sperm whales (Physeter macrocephalus), Vulnerable (IUCN)appear to enter short, but periodic, bouts of sleep throughout the day — an observation that Kaplan says could hint that sperm-whales are actually “the least sleep-dependent mammals known.”