Posted on 09/09/2026 4:27:57 AM PDT by Red Badger
* Whale gut gunk got a luxury rebrand.
* “Animalic” is doing some heavy lifting on that label.
* Ambergris is whale doo-doo with excellent PR.
=============================================================
That’s One Way to Smell Expensive At first glance, this highly coveted lump looks like something you’d step around on the sidewalk, not gleefully spray all over your body.
VIDEO AT LINK...........
In a TikTok from One Bold Chemist, this guy slices into it what’s described as “whale poop, worth over $10,000.” All of a sudden, the black gloves make sense.
He’s talking about ambergris, a waxy material that forms inside sperm whales and has a long history in perfumery. These days, that whale connection often comes through manufactured ingredients that recreate parts of its scent without using actual whale material.
If only everyone’s poop could be this fancy…
Chemistry has thankfully made it possible for us to get the joys of spraying whale poop on ourselves without actually having to spray fecal matter.
Louis Vuitton’s Imagination, one of the fragrances mentioned in the video, uses Ambrox, a molecule also found in ambergris. According to the brand, it was the starting point for a five-year creative process involving black tea and citrus. That’s quite a journey from a whale’s digestive tract to somebody’s date-night fragrance.
But getting from one to the other takes more than a fancy bottle.
It Starts With a Delicious Squid Dinner Sperm whales eat squid, including the hard, sharp beaks that don’t digest easily. Usually, those troublesome leftovers get vomited back out. Occasionally, they reach the intestines, where they can become bound into a growing mass of ambergris. Researchers think this may help protect the whale’s insides from the sharp bits.
A little calamari before the cologne. 🦑
“Whale poop” is the quick internet version, but ambergris is an unusual intestinal mass, and exactly how it leaves the whale is still debated. In fact, large pieces may only be released after the animal dies. Hence why a hunk of this stuff can sell for $10k or more.
Fresh ambergris also smells about as one would guess. To put it frankly, it smells like poop, not roses. Once it reaches the ocean, exposure to sunlight, air, and salt water gradually changes it. The dark, sticky material can become paler and waxier, losing its foul odor as it weathers.
Mature ambergris develops a more pleasant, musky scent. Perfumers also valued its ability to help a fragrance linger, which explains why anyone bothered with the stuff in the first place.
The Whale Wasn’t Working Alone
Turns out, whale poop isn’t the first time humans have decided to take odd secretions from animals and spread it all over their body.
Take musk, a fragrance note that seems as common and unassuming as rose, but I assure you, its origins are anything but rosey.
VIDEO AT LINK.............
Traditional deer musk came from a scent gland in male musk deer. And through some bizarre process, it was discovered that its powerful odor became more pleasant when diluted, and it helped fragrances last longer.
Then you have civet, which could possibly be the most uncomfortable of them all.
VIDEO AT LINK...............
The small mammal produces a pungent secretion near its anus to mark its territory. Perfumers found that, used sparingly, the material could soften into a useful addition to floral blends. Sylvaine Delacourte, formerly Guerlain’s director of fragrance creation, describes raw civet as intensely animalic, even fecal. Apparently, someone smelled that and decided that would be a perfect accompaniment to tuberose.
And last, but certainly not least, we have castoreum, a material sourced from the castor sacs near the base of a beaver’s tail.
VIDEO AT LINK.............
In perfume, it can bring a smoky, leathery character. The Perfume Society describes the concentrated material as intensely reminiscent of birch tar and leather, becoming more appealing when blended with other ingredients. That sophisticated leather note has a considerably less sophisticated origin story.
So really, whale poop is the least of our concerns here.
If anything, the big question is how, and I mean how, did humans look at a bum hole or mysterious sack under a beaver tale and think, “Hmmm, you know what I could do with this? MAKE A DELECTABLE SCENT.”
Human ingenuity never ceases to amaze.
Dear FRiends,
We need your continuing support to keep FR funded. Your donations are our sole source of funding. No sugar daddies, no advertisers, no paid memberships, no commercial sales, no gimmicks, no tax subsidies. No spam, no pop-ups, no ad trackers.
If you enjoy using FR and agree it's a worthwhile endeavor, please consider making a contribution today:
Click here: to donate by Credit Card
Or here: to donate by PayPal
Or by mail to: Free Republic, LLC - PO Box 9771 - Fresno, CA 93794
Thank you very much and God bless you,
Jim
Ambergris is not feces.
Not my Hawaiian Surf!
manufactured ingredients that recreate parts of its scent without using actual whale material.
So what's the real premise of this article? Feces or vomit, the perfume industry doesn't appear to need whales at this point. So what's the problem?
It’s not vomit, either. It’s most closely related to bile.
Thanks.
The problem is that there is something about which you are not properly outraged or disgusted.
Tell it to people who consume Tik Tok.
Years ago in grad school I was doing research that involved mailing questionnaires to several hundred chief financial officers of large corporations. While I never stated that their responses were anonymous, I wanted it to appear as though they were.
I contacted a printer to obtain invisible ink to run through my numbering machine so I could account for returned vs unreturned questionnaires so I could send out second requests.
He sent me a bottle of whale oil. It worked perfect. Under a black light I could clearly see the identifying number, but to the eyes, it appeared invisible. Worked perfect.
The artificial stuff is for the cheaper brands. Only the wealthy get the real poop..........😆
Per AI
Ambergris is a solid, waxy, and flammable substance created in the digestive system of sperm whales.
Origin and Formation
Diet: Sperm whales eat large amounts of squid and other cephalopods.
Protection: Undigested parts like sharp squid beaks can harm the whale’s gut.
Secretion: The whale’s digestive tract secretes a waxy substance to coat these sharp objects.
Expulsion: The whale passes or vomits this mass out into the ocean.
Scent Transformation
Fresh: Freshly produced ambergris has a strong, unpleasant, and fishy or fecal smell.
Aged: Floating in salt water under the sun for months or years causes it to harden and turn grey or brown.
Final Scent: It develops a sweet, earthy, musky, and pleasant aroma.
Just to be clear, there are still things that are not known about ambergris, but there are more clear statements I could make to clarify what I’ve already said.
Vomit is swallowed, partially digested food (i.e., not whale) that is regurgitated back up. The only thing “whale” in the vomit is digestive juices added to the food. Feces is when that food becomes fully digested and goes out the other end. There are generally three components to that. The digested food itself, gut bacteria, and the intestines slough off their lining not unlike we slough off skin - and that material becomes part of and is processed as a component of feces. So there is some “whale” in there, but, again, really not “whale”. Ambergris is a glandular secretion from the whale itself. Right now, best guess is that it appears to be a secretion that performs a function similar to nacre secretions in clams. In clams a bit of dirt or rock gets in and irritates the clam, it secretes nacre that hardens into a smooth coating on the dirt or rock to form what we call a pearl. I don’t think anyone would call a pearl “clam poop.” These ambergris secretions appear to perform a similar function for things like sharp chunks of giant squid beak, etc., that end up in the digestive tract of the whale. And it is believed it can come out either end, if it comes out at all.
That’s cool. Interesting.
Exactly! It's a substance found in the stomach. It's actually whale barf.
What I find interesting is; who goes around expressing the sent glands of beavers, civets and musk dears?
This person must be able to really charm an animal.
That very talented person really deserves that $10K an ounce.
;)
Having expressed the anal glands of dogs I wonder why no one has found a use for that disgusting mater.
At least it isn’t Lark’s Vomit.
Ambergris is not feces.
Yeah somebody told me a long time ago that it was “whale vomit” and that it washes up on shore. Not poop.
Ecclesiastes/10/1
Red B. : The verse is about the burden of foolishness, but the science in the article indicates that the "Stink" was there all along.
When I worked I had a lot problems with asthma and allergies and especially having to work in an office with women (mostly) who bathed in "assault" fragrances. It was often the olfactory equivalent of having to listen to 5 or 6 nearby cubes playing Rap music with the dial turned up to 11 for 8 hours a day.
Most perfumes and fragrances currently are made from some petro-chemicals. Here is a discussion on Reddit
"It is an utterly pointless discussion, made up almost entirely by pseudo science and people not knowing what they are talking about. Most of modern perfumery uses “synthetic” compounds for the creation of their accords. Naturals are by nature unreliable and will inherently vary. Batch variations in large scale production is a no go.
Now as far as synthetic goes, 95 percent of compounds are derived from nature and isolated. Only very few are purely developed in a lab with no natural origin.
Whether something smells synthetic or natural is really a question of the perfumers intentions and skills, not the ingredients.
As to costs, that is marketing, period! Perfume creation is cheap. Most bottles will sell with margins well in the hundreds of percents. Bottle development, payment to perfumer (unless independent) and marketing are the main drivers of cost.
Having worked with production of raw materials for the fragrance industry for well over ten years now, I can guarantee you it’s cheap as chips, even if naturally derived.
In the olden days when they macerated flowers, applied CO2 techniques and tinctures, there was an argument that costs were higher. To experience these practices today you almost exclusively have to go to indie perfumeries."
SirSniffs-a-Lot
5y ago
“Having worked with production of raw materials for the fragrance industry for well over ten years now, I can guarantee you it’s cheap as chips, even if naturally derived.”
I think this is why companies love Oud fragrances. Everyone knows it’s an expensive raw material so we naturally assume that an Oud fragrance has to be more expensive, so we don’t question it. We also don’t ask these companies for proof that they’re using real Oud, we just sort of take their word for it.
So a company can either add a minuscule amount of real Oud to a fragrance, or add some synthetic Oud, then hike the price way up, and nobody bats an eyelid... even when the juice inside still costs next to nothing.
I’ll admit it makes my cry a little inside to realise that all these gorgeous $200+ fragrances only contain like $2-3 of ingredients. I understand why, and it’s the same with many luxury items, that’s the way it works... but I do wish I could pick up a bottle of Xerjoff Nio for $10.00. The company would still be making a profit after all. Pretty please Xerjoff?
From: Found this weird thing in the Baltic
fritzkoenig •
1y ago
"If it heats up or starts smoking, throw it away from you ASAP - preferably into an area that would not cause a massive fire. Or come prepared with gloves and a plastic container with water in it. In this case, you found white phosphorus from incendiary bombs that were dumped into the Baltic Sea after WW2. Also wash hands very thoroughly after handling - or preferably do not handle with bare hands at all - as white phosphorus is very toxic."
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.