Curious World: Abyssal Creatures

¿How well do we know the marine world?

The human being lives in an environment which he does not know in its totality and yet seeks to venture into outer space in the hope of making great discoveries, which have, for the moment, been and many.

 

Abyssal Zone of the Ocean

But ... ¿what about the ocean? ¿How much do we know? We really do not know much about this blue world which contains infinities of secrets not yet discovered and even more strange are the creatures that inhabit it.

In this post I will share some species of fish and creatures of the rarest that inhabit these great depths of the ocean, a place even where the sun does not reach, a place where they inhabit creatures so strange that they seem extracted from a horror film, Fascinating creatures living in absolute darkness, living at temperatures between 0 ° and -3 °, which given the extreme conditions they live develop gigantism without mentioning that some species have really chilling teeth even some species have bioluminescent organs, for To put it another way, they shine in the dark.

The abyssal zone of the ocean, is an area very little known by man and that houses great mysteries, a very striking area since it is unknown in almost 80% that is what can be there. It is between 3,000 and 6,000 meters deep of the surface and as I mentioned before, the sunlight does not reach there, in the absence of sunlight, the fish that inhabit there must adapt to that totally dark environment to be able to see and to hunt its prey or To flee from their predators.

Let us go into the depths of the ocean, inhabiting creatures that are as fantastic as they are strange.

Let's start with the Octopus telescope, it is not known much about it, it measures barely 3 decimetres and as you can see in the photo is transparent body, being such a tiny and transparent creature, it is not surprising that we know little about him .

 

Octopus telescope

Continuing with the octopuses, we now find the octopus that inhabits approximately around 25,000 meters deep. With the tentacles extended it can reach 5 meters in diameter. The suction cups of this octopus emit a light of greenish color, that is thought that could be to attract pairs or it emits possibly to attract its prey and to hunt them in the dark.

More octopus, now with octopus dumbo: It inhabits the ocean depths from 3000 to 5000 meters deep. His nickname comes from the pair of wing-like flippers that pop out of his head. Its body is small not exceeding 20 cm in length.

octopus dumbo

Soccer fish: The curious ball-shaped body of this fish gives it its name. It is between 1000 and 4000 meters deep and one of its most significant features is that the female reaches a length of 45 cm, almost three times greater than the male.

Soccer fish

Dragonfish: It is one of the most chilling fish. You can get your teeth so long that you can not close your mouth. It is located between 4000 and 4500 meters and reaches 32 cm.

Dragonfish

Melanocetus johnsonii: is the scientific name of an abyssal fish, from the biological family of Melanocetidae, found in the tropics. It lives in depths normally of 3,000 - 4,000 meters reaching a maximum of up to 1,000 meters, has a kind of antenna on its head that springs from its nose in the form of a reed full of bioluminescent bacteria that lights as a decoy to attract other fish that They confuse this organ with worms or other organism being in the end their prey, grasping it with their great teeth to prevent the prey from escaping, and has a large mouth that can swallow specimens more than twice their own length. It is a way to take advantage of the lack of food in these areas.

Its red color makes it virtually invisible, its eyes are small.

Melanocetus johnsonii

Mertensia ovum: It is a predator of the Arctic Ocean that measures between 8 and 9 centimeters and reaches a swimming speed of about 14 cm per second.

Mertensia ovum

Xiphias gladius: Young swordfish. It lives in waters up to 800 meters and feeds on other fish and squid.

Xiphias gladius

Oarfish or king of herring: An oar fish, is the longest bony fish ever sighted, reaching 17 m in length. It has 400 thorns, of which the first dozen is elongated, forming a distinctive and showy crest mottled with red. He lives at a depth of about 1,000 meters and is occasionally found floating or stranded.

Oarfish or king of herring

Architeuthis Giant Squid: Considered mythical creatures, are marine animals of deep immersion that reach extraordinary dimensions; Recent estimates suggest a maximum of 15 m for males and 17-19 m for females. It has been speculated on the existence of specimens of much more than twenty meters and half a ton of weight, although this has not been able to be confirmed really. One of the largest specimens was a female of nearly 18 meters long, whose body was stranded on a beach in New Zealand in 1887. There is also mention of another specimen accidentally caught in 1933 in New Zealand waters, 21 meters Long and 275 kg in weight. A live giant squid has never been captured.

Architeuthis Giant Squid

The deep-sea species, moreover, live in a quite different way than their shallow-water siblings. For example, deep-sea fish have a much slower metabolism, and therefore tend to live longer and reproduce more slowly.

Bioluminescent fish

Generally, species living in abyssal waters or in the penumbra (upper layer of deep waters) are usually bioluminescent, that is, they produce their own light, which they can use to attract their prey (some fish have their organ Luminescent within the mouth), to identify with other specimens of its species or to escape some danger. Such light is generally produced by a colony of specific bacteria living inside the fish.

In addition, the fish that live in the penumbra layer have very developed eyes, not like the ones of the abyssal layer, that usually have small eyes and less developed.

There are many creatures in the bottom of the ocean that we do not know, different species that live hidden from the human eye, even on the same surface as there are places that are still unknown by man. This planet is home to a great diversity of life and in all possible ways, everything we know is incredible, but everything that we have yet to know is even more incredible. The sea world will always have us surprises.

Until the next post!

[Lxs]