It is fair- one might suppose the Outsider sharing knowledge weighed alongside his patience while being fitted for a wardrobe would balance neatly alongside Thranduil's attentions and-- very near-- fussing.

"How old was the calf? How large?" And he's hungry for this sort of information, to learn all he can about the sea, about the fish that live there, about tides and sailing and all these things formerly forbidden to him. He leans forward by degrees, enthralled.

"What do the whales of your world look like? A trader brought a book to my halls. It has the most intricate pictures of beasts not drawn by elven hands. Oliphaunts, which I had not seen, and whales. Crabs, a fish that was flat, as if it had been pressed." Thranduil had bought the book, of course, had looked through it. As had his Silvans. But books were not meant to last forever, and within five hundred years it was dust, though he had carefully scribed copies. He almost sounds... wistful.

"... what have the Men of your world done to them?"

(As if he needs to clarify first that it was mortals bringing doom down upon the world.)