#sea-squirt

#sea-squirt

"The most successful wildlife trips follow animal patterns and seasonality," says Condé Nast Traveler Top Travel Specialist Josh Geller of Embark Beyond.

"While whales and dolphins may temporarily move out of areas where there is significant naval sonar activity, the intensity of modern maritime conflict poses lethal risks."

Giant kraken-like octopuses that used powerful beaks to crunch through bones of prey were among the most formidable predators of the Cretaceous oceans. Some ancient octopus species reached up to 19 metres in length, meaning they would have rivalled and possibly even preyed upon apex predators such as mosasaurs and plesiosaurs.

When light shines through water, colors with longer wavelengths are absorbed by the water, with the longest wavelengths absorbed first. Blue and violet have the shortest wavelengths of visible light, so they are able to penetrate the deepest.

"Not only are acts like that illegal, but it's really harming a very important, like, a biodiversity hotspot that we have right out here," Brent Fish, an aquarist with Birch Aquarium, stated.

The analysis grouped the krakens into two species: Nanaimoteuthis jeletzkyi and N. haggarti, and discovered that they belong to the same evolutionary group as modern dumbo octopuses.

Young fish that spent more of their waking hours being active tended to live longer than did more-sluggish fish. Young fish that restricted their sleep schedule to evening hours also reached a riper age than did those that slept more during the day.

Each nudibranch in this archive is three inches long, grown-up size, as the artist puts it, and each one is a faithful replica of a real species. The cerata, those finger-like projections on a nudibranch's back that serve as gills and defensive organs, are recreated individually in wool, each in the right shape and color for its species.

During major floods, thousands of tiny fish convene at Luvilombo Falls in the upper Congo River Basin to undertake a peculiar vertical migration, described for the first time today in Scientific Reports.

This unassuming marine macroalgae (to give it its proper name) is packed full of vital minerals and nutrients, and can make for an unglamorous, yet functional addition to your diet. Seaweed is exactly as the name suggests - an edible marine algae that grows along coastlines and on rocks under the water. It comes in thousands of varieties, but the ones we eat most commonly fall into three groups: brown (like kelp and wakame), red (nori, dulse), and green (sea lettuce).

Few transformations in the history of life have been as extreme as the embrace of the ocean by seagrass. Like whales and dolphins, modern seagrasses descend from land-dwelling ancestors.

The bodies of the crabs displayed male reproductive structures, while other parts showcased female features, including gonopores, said K.S. Anoop Das.

Which animals came first? For more than a century, most evidence suggested that sponges, immobile filter-feeders that lack muscles, neurons and other specialized tissues, were the first animal lineages to emerge. Then, in 2008, a genomic study pointed to a head-scratching rival: dazzling, translucent predators called comb jellies, or ctenophores, with nerves, muscles and other sophisticated features. That single study ignited a debate that has raged for nearly 20 years, sparking fierce arguments about how complexity evolved in animals.

In a recent study published in the zoology journal Crustaceana, scientists working in Silent Valley National Park reported a new variety of the crab that exhibits both male and female traits. Our new crab friends, of the species Vela carli, are freshwater dwellers that hang out in the streams of the Western Ghats in India.

Some deep-sea fish may be able to see light in a different way from most other vertebrates, according to a new study. The fish, found in the Red Sea, have what the scientists behind the new study describe as hybrid photoreceptorslight-sensing cells in the retina that combine elements of two distinct kinds of photoreceptors, cones and rods. In human retinas, cone cells enable us to see in bright environments, detecting color and fine detail,

Wooden objects carrying the marks of carving and use could be the oldest wooden tools ever found. Researchers dated the artefacts, found in what is now Greece, to 430,000 years ago - and suggest they might have been made by early Neanderthals or their ancestors, Homo heidelbergensis. A separate study describes 480,000-old flint-knapping tools made from antler and elephant bone, from what is now the United Kingdom.

Argentina's deep sea holds more biodiversity than scientists previously thought. An expedition that traveled from the north of Buenos Aires province to Tierra del Fuego, the country's southernmost point, observed the world's largest known Bathelia candida coral reef, worms, sea urchins, snails, anemones, and a specimen that captured the public's attention: a rare phantom jellyfish that can grow as large as a school bus.

The lava heron also has a much thicker bill than other closely related herons - an adaptation linked to feeding among sharp volcanic rocks and hard-shelled prey. "What we learned was something that hadn't been reported before," Mendales said. The discovery underscores how much remains unknown, even in iconic places like the Galápagos, said John Dumbacher, the Academy's curator of birds and mammals and Mendales' thesis adviser.

She looks really good for what I can see through the window,

We've documented sightings of glass squids to better understand the remarkable transformations they undergo from hatchlings to adults. This new observation, captured in ultra high-resolution 4K, allowed us to zoom in on a juvenile likely no bigger than a baby carrot and reveal more details than we have been able to see before.