gray whale
gray whale noun: a baleen whale, Eschrichtius robustus, from the north Pacific.

Noun
gray whale (plural gray whales)
- A baleen whale, Eschrichtius robustus, from the north Pacific
- Synonyms:
- grayback whale, grayback, California gray whale, Pacific gray whale, Korean gray whale, desert whale, scrag whale, ripsack, mussel digger, devilfish
Synonyms of gray whale
- grayback whale
- grayback
- California gray whale
- Pacific gray whale
- Korean gray whale
- desert whale
- ripsack
- mussel digger
- devilfish
- scrag whale
Forms of gray whale
| plural | gray whales |
|---|---|
| alternative form | grey whale |
Origin of gray whale
Disputed. Either from the whale’s coloration, or after British zoologist John Edward Gray, who first recognized it as a distinct genus in 1864.
Questions about gray whale
- What does gray whale mean?
- Gray whale means a baleen whale, Eschrichtius robustus, from the north Pacific.
- What part of speech is gray whale?
- Gray whale is a noun.
- What is the plural of gray whale?
- The plural of gray whale is gray whales.
Words near gray whale in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: gray whale (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Cite this entry: “gray whale.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/gray_whale. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.
