A POST HERE SEVERAL MONTHS AGO closed with the “Really Odd Fact” that blenny-like pearlfish (Periclimenes imperator) have a habit of taking up residence in the … well…rear ends of sea cucumbers. The overall post, “Sea Cucumbers – Superheroes of the Sea,” was about the fact that sea cucumbers, often ignored as inert, unimportant creatures, actually had a lot to recommend them. THE PEARLFISH/CUCUMBER EQUATION The pearlfish/cuke interaction is generally described as commensal relationship, but that term implies a
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
PYGMY SEAHORSES (HIPPOCAMPUS BARGIBANTI) are small, fragile creatures of the Indo-Pacific, amazing in their ability to blend in with the colorful sea fans they spend their lives on. The question was: Do they choose the sea fan to match their color or do they acclimate to match the host sea fan’s color? Watch this awesome video from the equally amazing folks at Deep Look to find out – and learn a lot about pygmy seahorses
AN AUSTRALIAN MARINE BIOLOGIST HAS DISCOVERED A PREVIOUSLY UNKNOWN BLUE HOLE in a remote area of the Great Barrier Reef, some 120 miles/200 kilometers from the nearest island. Unlike the famous 400-foot-deep Great Blue Hole of Belize, this blue hole is about 100 feet/300 meters deep at its center and serves as a protected habitat for healthy corals, fish and other marine life. To keep it that way, he won’t tell anybody where it is.
MANTIS SHRIMPS ARE FAMOUS FOR HAVING UNIQUE VISUAL CAPABILITIES – not only do they have 16 color receptors in their eyes, they can see six types of polarized light properties that are invisible to us human beings. Presumably, this helps them in a lot of ways, from hunting to avoiding being hunted, possibly for navigation and other uses. Polarized vision is complicated. FORTUNATELY: University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign engineer Viktor Gruev was inspired to develop a camera
THE (NEARLY IMMORTAL) LIVES OF SEA URCHINS IS THE FOCUS of this terrific video from the terrific folks at PBS’s Deep Look. Like most marine denizens, they endure long – and perilous – journeys as tiny larvae before settling into on some suitable substrate for a life eating algae. Once they transform into adults, they’re pretty much invulnerable, says Deep Look, with life expectancy as long at 200 years. The transformation process is amazing.
I’M NOT SURE WHETHER THIS IS FASCINATING OR CREEPY, but it does give us an idea of how sea stars and other echinoderms move along on little, hydraulically-operated tube feet. Apparently the poor guy got stranded on the sand as the tide went out. The videographer, Zeb Hallock, notes that after shooting the video, he put it and other sea stars back in the water.
NOT MUCH TEXT, JUST A TERRIFIC VIDEO OF A HUMPBACK WHALE’S RAINBOW, posted on Instagram by “Wildlife Photographer, Drone Enthusiast and Whale Lover” Domenic Biagini (@dolphinsafaridom). He’s based in La Jolla, CA.
THIS POST HAS TWO PARTS: One is a terrific video about giant larvaceans, deep seazooplankton, featuring a cast of many other deep sea denizens and a terrific jazz piano score (It’s from the estimable folks at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, naturally). Then there’s the article from the quarterly science magazine Cosmos, focusing on research on giant larvaceans’ role in sequestering carbon in their “mucus houses” – yes, “mucus houses” – and sending it to
WHAT’S MORE ADORABLE THAN PHOTOS OF TWO EMPEROR PENGUINS? A “selfie” video taken by the penguins themselves. Admittedly, I’m hardly the first to take it up – posted March 7th, it’s been featured on television news and print media around the world and the 38-second video has had more than 400,000 views – but, really, it’s irresistible. JUST HAPPENED TO BE TURNED ON Basically, two curious emperor penguins – the noble species featured in the 2005
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