How many cows would it take to equal the gross weight of one blue whale?

Answer 1

It depends on the weight of the cows in question, and the weight of the whale itself. The average adult blue whale weighs about 180 tons. So, if the cows have an average weight of 1,000 lbs, then it would take 403.2 of them to equal the gross weight of a Blue Whale.

Answer 2

That depends. If we pack them in tight, we could get quite a few more than if we want to keep them all alive. Assuming the cows will smear together in the deeper levels anyway, we will assume a smooth packing function.

Using 1.2 cubic meters as the volume of the typical cow, we now need to determine which ocean we want to fill. The Pacific is the king of the oceans, and a good choice for packing cattle.

The Pacific enjoys a surface area of 156 million square km, and an average depth of 4 km. This produces a volume of 6.2x10^17 cubic meters. We divide that by 1.2, and obtain about half a quintillion cows. 520 quadrillion, to be a little more precise.

If we want to fill only the surface of the ocean, not its depth, we could make do with far fewer cows.