Posts
(1)This psychedelic octopus was also found in the frigid waters off Antarctica, one of the world’s most pristine marine environments.
(2)These deep-sea sea cucumbers, all moving in the same direction, were abundant in the area explored.
(3)The collapse of the 5,000-year-old ice shelves over the last dozen years gave the scientists a unique opportunity to see new species, such as this amphipod crustacean.
(4)Explorers off the coast of Antarctica found fast-growing sea squirt settlements, which apparently started colonizing the area only after ice shelves collapsed.
Story in "comments".
1 comment:
2007-02-25
Strange Sea Creatures Found in Antarctica By Deborah Zabarenko, Reuters
WASHINGTON (Feb. 25) - Spindly orange sea stars, fan-finned ice fish and herds
of roving sea cucumbers are among the exotic creatures spied off the Antarctic
coast in an area formerly covered by ice, scientists reported on Sunday.
This is the first time explorers have been able to catalog wildlife where two
mammoth ice shelves used to extend for some 3,900 square miles over the Weddell
Sea .
At least 5,000 years old, the ice shelves collapsed in two stages over the last
dozen years. One crumbled 12 years ago and the other followed in 2002.
Global warming is seen as the culprit behind the ice shelves' demise, said
Gauthier Chapelle of the Polar Foundation in Brussels.
"These kind of collapses are expected to happen more," he said. "What we're
observing here is probably going to happen elsewhere around Antarctica."
Melting ice shelves are not expected to directly contribute much to global sea
level rise, but glaciologists believe these vast swaths of ice act like dams to
slow down glaciers as they move over the Antarctic land mass toward the coast.
Without the ice shelves, glaciers may move over the water more quickly, and this
would substantially add to rising seas.
Since 1974, 5,213 square miles of ice shelves have disintegrated in the
Antarctic Peninsula.
More Deep Sea Life Discovered
But the collapse of the ice shelves gave the scientists a unique opportunity to
see what had been hidden beneath them; before the collapse, researchers could
only peer through holes drilled deep into the ice.
Chapelle and other scientists from 14 nations traveled to the area aboard the
icebreaking vessel Polarstern in a 10-week voyage to investigate underwater
wildlife along the Antarctic peninsula, the part of the southern continent that
curves up toward South America.
Looking down 2,800 feet into the icy water -- a comparatively shallow depth --
they found fauna usually associated with seabeds about three times that deep, in
places where the creatures must adapt to scarcity to survive.
There were blue ice fish, with dorsal fins like ribbed fans and blood that lacks
red cells, an adaptation that makes the blood more fluid and easier to pump
through the animal's body, conserving energy at low temperatures.
Long-limbed sea stars, some with more than the usual five appendages, mingled
with the ice fish, and groups of sea cucumbers were observed moving together,
all in one direction.
The explorers also found thick settlements of fast-growing animals called sea
squirts, which look like gelatinous bags, which apparently started colonizing
the area only after the ice shelves collapsed.
Among the hundreds of specimens collected, the scientists identified 15 possible
new species of shrimp-like amphipods, and four possible new species of
cnidarians, organisms related to coral, jellyfish and sea anemones, the
scientists said in a statement.
These specimens will be analyzed to determine whether they in fact are newly
discovered species.
This psychedelic octopus was also found in the frigid waters off Antarctica, one of the world’s most pristine marine environments.
These deep-sea sea cucumbers, all moving in the same direction, were abundant in the area explored.
The collapse of the 5,000-year-old ice shelves over the last dozen years gave the scientists a unique opportunity to see new species, such as this amphipod crustacean.
Explorers off the coast of Antarctica found fast-growing sea squirt settlements, which apparently started colonizing the area only after ice shelves collapsed.
Post a Comment