Silence And Calmness Can Be Extremely Moving. #Whale #MexicoPelagico #PelagicLife #ocean #nature #whale

Park with large spherical rocks. Mangrove and beach in front of the resort. Our tent. The crocodiles underneath the bridge. (I took all pictures but the ones of the mangrove and the beach)

The Ghost, Craig Parry’s photo of the famed white whale Migaloo won first place in the underwater world category at the 2017 Golden Turtle International Photography Competition in Moscow this week.

Dinoflagellates! These bizarre microorganisms are found all over the ocean, and occasionally freshwater lakes and ponds. Some are photosynthetic, some are predators, some are both! They are also the plankton responsible for toxic red tides. 

The first two pictures show Pyrocystis dinoflagellates.  These are closely related to the dinoflagellates that bioluminesce a bright blue along coastal waters. In the top picture, you can see a cell dividing its nucleus into two, as well as some sort of protective cyst in the lower right corner.

The 3rd picture is a bloom of Gymnodinium dinoflagellates, and the last picture is a close-up. See the nucleus?

More neat facts: some dinoflagellates have 215 billion base pairs in their genome. For comparison, the human genome is made up of about 3 billion base pairs! No one really knows why they have so much DNA, most of which is heavily modified and wrapped with re-purposed virus proteins. 

From Kane Lynch and our stats dept.

What a Nut!— Invasive Species Week

This ctenophore (a stingless jellyfish-like animal) called a sea walnut is native to the east coast of North and South America. In 1982, it was discovered in the Black Sea, where it was transported by ballast water. It subsequently spread to the Caspian Sea. In both places, it multiplied and formed immense populations. The sea walnuts contributed to the collapse of local fisheries because they feed on zooplankton that the commercial fish also consume. Mnemiopsis leidy has also been discovered in the Mediterranean, Baltic, and North Seas.

Photo Credit: Marco Faasse, World Register of Marine Species

Annual Arctic sea ice minimum, 1979-2016

Sharks – like this sandbar shark in Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary – have several adaptations that make them excellent predators. 

Specialized organs called ampullae of Lorenzini help sharks sense electric fields in the water generated by other fish. Their eyes, too, are specially adapted: all shark eyes have a tapetum lucidum, a layer of mirrored crystals located behind the retina, allowing them to see in in low light conditions and up to ten times better than humans in clear water. 

Despite these adaptations, sandbar sharks and other sharks typically pose little threat to humans. We’re more dangerous to them than they are to us! 

(Photo: Nick Zachar/NOAA) 

[Image description: A black-and-white photo of a sandbar shark.]

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Behold the blue glaucus (Glaucus atlanticus), a tiny sea slug that packs a powerful punch! Growing only about 1.2 in (3 cm) long, it’s also known as the blue dragon, and it specializes in eating venomous siphonophores—like the Portuguese man o' war. It then repurposes the toxic chemicals from its prey as a defense for itself. The blue glaucus’ sting has been known to induce nausea, vomiting, and agonizing pain. Their venom can remain active even after death!

Photo: drmattnimbs, CC BY-NC 4.0, iNaturalist