Snails and other mollusks
FOR MANY OF US, DIVING IS ZEN, A MEDITATIVE EXPERIENCE. For me, communing with our fellow travelers under the sea is a major part of it. Spending time on the sandy bottom contemplating a queen conch while its (somewhat eerie) conch eyes contemplate me is a part of that. Some places are better for conch fellowship than others. I’ve found friendly conchs at Little Cayman, Roatan and in the Bahamas (this queen conch specimen was
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THREE INCHES LONG, MOSTLY DEEP-WATER DENIZENS and found in Japanese waters, bioluminescent firefly squid (Watasenia scintillans) are not particularly familiar to western divers. But once a year, female fireflies come to the surface in large, nightly aggregations and put on dazzling shows of light. “The squids’ twinkling displays have captured scientists’ attention since the early 20th century, and have helped researchers better understand the chemistry of bioluminescence,” says science writer Elizabeth Preston in “Flashes of
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“INCONSPICUOUS BATTLEGROUND” bioGraphic.com An area off South Australia may seem like a mundane stretch of coastline but beneath the waters a spectacular event takes place each year – normally solitary giant Australian cuttlefish (Sepia apama) gather to compete for mates. The event is spectacular and so is the photography by Justin Gilligan (the image above is by a different photographer). “THIS IS THE SOUND A DOLPHIN MIGHT HEAR IF IT’S ABOUT TO BECOME DINNER” News
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THE FIRST PART OF THIS VIDEO OUTTAKE FROM BBC’S BLUE PLANET is amazing enough. A giant Florida horse conch (Triplofusus papillosus) chases, catches, dines on a smaller tulip snail (Fasciolaria tulipa). To some, perhaps gruesome but it’s part of the web of life. KEEP WATCHING What happens then is equally engaging. A real estate battle follows almost immediately as hermit crabs (any of several species in Family Diogenidae) scramble to take up
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FINDING A FRIENDLY OCTOPUS ON YOUR PHOTO SHOOT DIVE IS A RARE JOY. Sony Corporation and Kelly Tarlton’s SEA LIFE Aquarium in Auckland, New Zealand, turned the tables. The concept: An octopus takes photos of people. The octopus is Rambo, so named because he wrecked two camera systems in the course of the training. RAMBO RULES Of course, the concept in which an octopus takes photos of people is a long-running performance art commercial for Sony’s TX30 camera,
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NOT THE ONES ON YOUR DINNER TABLE (presumably). But scallops you might be eyeing during a dive may well be looking back at you, possibly contemplating an escape with a sort of jet propulsion created by clapping their shells together. And, they see through as many as 200 grain-sized, complex eyes located at the tips of tentacles extended past their shells, each resembling the structure of a reflecting telescope with a tiny concave mirror. “WHAT”
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IN THE FOOD CHAIN PART OF THE WEB OF LIFE, there are predators (like lions), who actually hunt prey, and “kleptoparasites” (like hyenas), whose specialty is stealing the prey out from under the predator who just killed it. Marine biologists studying the tiny, colorful nudibranch Cratena peregina have added a new concept to both science and the language: “kleptopredation,” or consuming not just something else’s prey, but that “Something” itself. NEWLY DISCOVERED BEHAVIOR It’s long
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THE HEADLINE SOUNDS WHIMSICAL – Yes, oysters can ‘hear.’ They probably wish we’d clam up. But the concept is serious. A team of researchers in France have determined that oysters react to many of the sounds of underwater noise pollution, like the engines of passing ships, wind turbines and pile driving. NOISE LIKELY A THREAT TO MANY FORMS OF MARINE LIFE Underwater noise pollution has long been a concern regarding whales and fishes. It’s been
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