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The article says that the purpose of bait balls is that it makes the fish less likely to be eaten than they would be as lone individuals. I think this explanation is a bit weak. If all of the fish darted away in different directions, more would survive -- but they must stay together (e.g., traveling to spawning grounds, heading for river/ocean), so this isn't an option. I've also heard another explanation: the swarm is intended to look like one, massive animal and intimidate predators. This also seems a weak explanation... it obviously does not work. Predators are not intimidated, but enticed, and readily feed on the bait ball. I believe there is a much better explanation...
Shoals must stay together for reasons of survival. As an individual fish in a shoal, what would give you the best chance of survival when predators attack? The answer is simple: using your comrades as shields. Packing tightly into a ball, each individual hopes to get to the center of the mass and put its fellows between itself and danger. This invokes the characteristic swarm behavior, and forms a rolling ball of fish. Those who stay packed in the middle of the ball will often survive attacks by predators and live to see another day. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.142.175.23 ( talk) 18:45, 27 August 2011 (UTC)
An angry warring editor has been replacing, on articles everywhere as well as the Bait ball article, the term rorqual whales with rorqual. He/she reasons that rorqual is a type of whale, so it is redundant to refer to them as rorqual whales. Of course that is technically correct, but in my view "rorqual whales" is a more transparent term for many readers, probably most readers, who will not be aware that a rorqual is a type of whale. -- Epipelagic ( talk) 05:57, 7 November 2013 (UTC)
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