Author: Helen Scales
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Underwater robots listen out for whales
Whales are tough crowd to study. They swim all over the place and hold their breath for ages – those poor cetacean biologists must have a heck of a time keeping up with them. Well, one way of tracking them is to listen for their songs – but don’t just stick your head underwater and…
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Your chance to name an ocean critter
Ever fancied choosing a name for a new species? Well, now’s your chance. To celebrate the upcoming World Oceans Day, researchers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography want some help naming an awesome deep sea worm found 1km beneath the waves on a whale fall (the body of a dead whale that’s drifted down to the…
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Who’s the daddy?
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IAU-E7KLoaY&feature=player_embedded[/youtube] 20 leopard sharks born in April at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, after their mother went through a 12-month pregnancy. But the question is – Who’s the Daddy? PhD student Andy Nosal is doing a paternity test on the little sharks to work out how many males were involved in their conception (chances are, it’s more…
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How to get a horseshoe crab in the mood
Persuading prehistoric-looking horseshoe crabs to mate in captivity may not be on most of our minds, but Carmela Cuomo from the University of New Haven spent 10 years figuring out how to get them in the mood. And it turns out all you need is some sand from home. Horseshoe crabs look like a weird type…
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When one set of sex organs just isn’t enough
Chimeras are weird-looking cousins of sharks that get up to some strange things in the deep sea – the group includes rat fish, rabbit fish, and elephant fish. Here’s Matt Gollock from The Zoological Society of London, on the Naked Oceans podcast (part of our 12 Critters of Christmas special), introducing these peculiar creatures, including…
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It’s a long wait for Nemo
The good people at the Disney corporation have made sure we all know who this fish is. Of course it’s Nemo aka the clown anemone fish, (Amphiprion percula). But there are some details the movie-makers left out – and let’s face it, they…
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How to catch a basking shark
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7dSItrbH0k&feature=player_embedded[/youtube] Rare film footage of a basking shark being caught by Norwegian fishermen in the 1970s (Warning – it gets a little bit bloody). As the film shows, catching a basking shark is not really something to be proud of (especially if you have a harpoon gun to hand). It’s easy: just sneak up behind…
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no fins, no suit… just one breath
William Trubridge swims through the Arch at the Blue Hole in Dahab (an infamous spot, deadly for scuba divers) with no fins, no suit, and just one breath of air. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrXQbucZUDA[/youtube] It’s 60m (196 feet) down and 30m (98 feet) across. Insane. Pure and simple. (But also very awesome). And here’s Natalia Molchanova doing the same thing…
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Introducing Carl Safina, the bluefin tuna
At the end of every Naked Oceans podcast there’s a bit where we ask a marine expert “If you were a marine critter, which would you be, and why…?” We’re nearing the end of our first series of podcasts and we’ve had all sorts of great species added to our Critter of the Month hall…
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World without fish
Another book on my to-read list (so no, this isn’t a review, just a suggestion). Mark Kurlansky has written lots of books about fish (Cod is still a bestseller after more than a decade – quite rightly) but this is the first one aimed at getting the message across to the younger generation that we…