My soul is full of longing for the sea

Why do we love the sea? It is because it has some potent power to make us think things we like to think.” - Robert Henri

[fhauvhebsucbejdiak]

‘Brinicle’ Ice Finger of Death - BBC

As sea water freezes to form surface ice, the remaining brine sinks, being much denser and colder than the surrounding water. As it descends, the surrounding water freezes upon contact, creating a ‘brinicle’, a frozen sheath of ice that grows downward towards the sea floor. When it touches the sea floor, it kills anything it touches, encasing them in a tomb of ice.

Attenborough narrated video - BBC

© BBC

[cool-critters]

Rhinopias eschmeyeri

Rhinopias eschmeyeri is a Scorpionfish from the Indo-West Pacific. It grows to an average size of 16.6 cm in length. R. eschmeyeri is native to the tropical western Indo-Pacific. Its range extends from the coasts of East Africa to Japan, Indonesia and the northern half of Australia. Its depth range is 18 to 55 m and it is usually found on coral reefs or rubble seabeds.

photo credits: Steve Childs

[nubbsgalore]

give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime you destroy the oceans. in fact, according to a recent study published in the journal science, ocean life faces mass extinction.  

a team of scientists, in a groundbreaking analysis of data from hundreds of sources, have concluded that humans are on the verge of causing unprecedented damage to the oceans and the animals living in them.

"we may be sitting on a precipice of a major extinction event,” said douglas j. mccauley, an ecologist at the university of california, santa barbara, and an author of the new research. 

the study notes, for example, that bottom trawlers scraping large nets across the sea floor have already affected 20 million square miles of ocean, turning parts of the continental shelf to rubble.

photos by: adam baugh, roland bach, jordi chias, thomas p. peschak, david lopresti, deron verbeck, brian skerry and claudio stoppato

[ftcreature]

Fried Egg Jellyfish Are Kind of Adorable – & That’s No Yolk.

There are two species that hold the whimsical title of “Fried Egg Jellyfish”: Phacellophora camtschatica and Cotylorhiza tuberculata though the two are quite different from each other in all aspects beside appearance.

Phacellophora camtschatica is a huge jelly that prefers colder waters. It’s bell can reach up to 2 ft across and its dozens of tentacles reach over 20 ft long! If you don’t think this floating egg creature looks very menacing, you’d be right. It has a very weak sting and many small crustaceans take advantage of the jelly by riding on its bell (breakfast to go…?) while snatching up extra food.

Cotylorhiza tuberculata is a much smaller jellyfish that hangs out in warmer waters. It only reaches about 35 cm in diameter, so don’t go for this Fried Egg Jelly if you want a big breakfast. Unlike most jellyfish, C. tuberculata can swim on its own, without relying on the currents for movement. It’s sting (if you can even call it that) is so feeble that it has very little to no effect on humans at all. I mean, it does look like a breakfast food, after all… how powerful could it be? 

[whatthefauna]

This beautiful jellyfish is the flower hat jelly. It’s a fierce predator in the west Pacific, and uses its tentacles to sting prey. When not in use, the tentacles coil up into its bell compartment, as seen here.

Image credit: Frans Lanting, Monterey Bay Aquarium

[frozenplanet-blog-blog]

Humboldt squid

[popthirdworld]

For those of you out of Australia, a shark attacked someone and so the government has called for a giant kill of sharks in the area. Maassive protests have been held on beaches across Australia to protest this slaughter.

This dude is Australian Navy Diver Paul de Gelder who 5 years ago lost his arm and leg to a massive bull shark in Sydney Harbour. He is speaking out against the mass slaughter of sharks around Western Australia. Paul de Gelder is a champ.

[sallysnowglobe]

Couldn’t resist reblogging x

[the-shark-blog]

Love sharks, but dislike Discovery’s Shark Week? Here’s some videos, shows, and documentaries you can watch instead:

National Geographic: Shark Superhighway [Netflix]

Sharks of the Mediterranean: A Vanishing Kingdom [Netflix]

Search for the Great Sharks: IMAX [

[thelovelyseas]

golfo (11) by sea zoom on Flickr.

[libutron]

The curiosities of the Blue dragon nudibranch

Commonly referred to as the Blue dragon nudibranch, Pteraeolidia ianthina (Nudibranchia - Facelinidae), is a remarkable species of sea slug native to the Indo-Pacific region.

This is an extremely elongate species up to 5cm long, with large, curved arches of cerata (the projections on the upper surfaces of the body) along the length of the body. The cephalic tentacles have two distinctive dark purple (or blue) bands.

Although the body color of this nudibranch is translucent tan, the cerata, which are mostly blue or dark purple, lavender or golden brown, give the nudibranch most of its apparent color.

The Blue dragon nudibranch has many amazing survival strategies. When touched, the nudibranch will “flare” its cerata and the nematocysts will discharge on contact (it is one of the few nudibranchs with a sting strong enough to be felt by humans though usually not in areas with thicker skin such as the palm of the hand).

It is also able to autotomize (lose or detach) the posterior part of its body in order to distract, or free itself from, a potential predator. Later, the missing portion can be regenerated.

Another curiosity of this species is that the cerata contain zooxanthellae of the genus Symbiodinium that exhibit the capacity for photosynthesis, and they grow while reside in the sea slug. This symbiotic relationship with the algae helps the adult nudibranch to overcome a period of food shortage by getting photosynthetic products.

References: [1] - [2] - [3] - [4]

Photo credit: ©Sylke Rohrlach

Locality: New South Wales, Australia

[sharkhugger]

Petition to the Australia Environmental Protection Agency to  Stop the Western Australia Shark Cull

The WA shark cull program must stop, and the EPA has the power to make this happen. 

Please help by joining us in asking the EPA to not allow a three year extension to the shark cull program.  Sign the petition below and we’ll forward your signature to the agency so all our voices can be heard! Via Sea Shepard Australia

[canislycaon-deactivated20150125]

For the rest of us Americans, this doesn’t mean our EPA. We don’t have that kind of authority. The EPA barely has the authority to moderate stuff in the States. There it is called the Environmental Protection Authority. If you live in Australia (which I know some of you followers do), please sign this.

[trynottodrown]

no sign this wherever you live I don’t care if you live in a cave in the desert

[thisblogdeadyeet]

[xpineapplethiefx]

It’s a mix of hell and outer space.

[sobrietykilledtheteenager-blog]

how are u going to tell me mermaids dont exist then 

[sextspert]

if they’re as ugly as the rest of those things i don’t wanna know if they exist

[trynottodrown]

Blue lined LJ  | Saspotato

[odditiesoflife]

The Amazing Jellies

Jellyfish or jellies are the major non-polyp form of individuals of the phylum Cnidaria. They are free-swimming marine animals consisting of a gelatinous umbrella-shaped bell and trailing tentacles. Most jellies are bioluminescent (self-producing light), resembling colorful, floating lamps. Jellyfish have roamed the seas for 500 to 700 million years, making them the oldest multi-organ animal on the planet.

source 1, 2

[fightingforanimals-deactivated2]

This is Double Trouble, possibly one of the most famous cats from the science field, for all the wrong reasons.

Double Trouble was a friendly ginger tabby cat, but her loving and docile personality resulted in her being abused and exploited, subjected to brutal torture for months and months.

She was subjected to invasive surgeries on her head and ears, including her skull and brain. 

The first operation she was subjected to was to drill a steel frame into her skull, to keep her head completely still while the scientists worked on her. 

The second operation involved cutting into her skull and applying a toxic substance into her inner ears, to deafen her. They implanted electrical devices in her ears too, deep inside the canals.

What is perhaps most horrifying about this torturous procedure, is that Double Trouble was recorded actually waking up during the surgery, because her anaesthesia wore off. Vets say she would have woken and been in absolute agony and fear, while the scientists drilled into her skull and brain. Held by the metal frame and groggy from the anaesthesia, she would not have been able to move away or defend herself.

This wasn’t a lone example of negligence - another cat was documented waking up during a similar surgery. 

After these gruesome procedures, Double Trouble was zipped up tight in a nylon bag to keep her still, and her head was bolted still, using the frame still attached to her skull. Completely immobile, scientists played a series of noises to her from different directions, sounds which likely hurt her fragile ears which were still sore from the procedures, and if she were able to hear at all, she would have been very frightened and in a lot of discomfort.

Before each session, the scientists starved Double Trouble, completely depriving her of food. This was because they could then use little pieces of food as a ‘reward’, to coerce her into cooperating during the procedures. 

Her health deteriorated rapidly, caused by the cruelty and nature of these surgeries, and no doubt from lack of food and severe stress. She was documented to shiver and twitch, and clinical notes on her file say this was a ‘neurological sign’. Her face became partially paralysed, and the head wounds inflicted on her never healed. More than three months after scientists first noticed this, they finally made a note on her file: “open, moist, w/bloody purulent discharge, moderate swelling." 

Double Trouble suffered an antibiotic-resistant infection as a result from her wounds, but rather than giving her proper veterinary treatment, scientists continued to use her for further experiments. Almost two months of misery, of fear, and of pain followed. One of the last entries on her file stated that she ‘appeared depressed’.

Eventually, the scientists concluded that she was too sick to be of any use to them, and that the experiments would stop. Rather than taking her to a vet so she could finally begin recovery, they opted to kill her, decapitating her head and removing her brain so they could dissect it. 

These painful, horrifying experiments - on 30 cats per year - were not even to ‘improve human health’, as one might expect. They were actually carried out by the University of Winconsin-Madison to “keep up a productive publication record that ensures our constant funding.”

In other words, these trusting and helpless animals were tortured for profit. Double Trouble, and many cats like her, suffered abuse and terror at the hands of people she trusted because the establishment wanted to look as though they were doing useful and benficial things with their fund money.

No publication has even used this experiment. No peer-reviewed papers have mentioned the abuse Double Trouble suffered at the hands of this prestigious university. Their experiment had failed. She’d died for nothing.

Other experiments conducted at this university have caused abject suffering and abuse for animals. All cats profiled and checked out by undercover activists showed that they were suffering from chronic infection. The USDA has noted that some cats have died as a result of these infections, and one cat named NJ had to have an eye removed after an implanted metal coil caused severe infection in her face. The USDA fined the university after one cat named Broc was burned so badly by a heating pad that she required surgery. 

Yet, the experiments continue. They have run up a total of more than $3 million in tax money, and the number climbs. The experimenter who is leading the groups has admitted: “our goal is not to produce a clinical treatment or a cure.”

Other researchers around the world are using non-animal methods to create results for similar procedures, with great success. Yet the University of Winconsin-Madison continue to perform these deadly, painful and useless experiments on dozens of cats per year.

Please take the time to sign this petition and help cats like Double Trouble from dying at the hands of this university. Enough public anger will put an end to this barbaric practice.

You are their only hope.

[finalskin]

i want to cry and scream and rip their heads off. human beings are the most vile and disgusting creatures on this planet. funny they like to talk about respect but none is ever given.

[deadisbeautylost-deactivated201]

Sounds of my heart breaking

[voxamberlynn]

SIGN THIS SHIT.

[supertzarr]

Fuck your animal testing pieces of shit. I hope you all rot for hurting an animal

[betheirvoiceseathechange-deacti]

Beluga Whale (Delphinapterus leucas) Fast Facts!

Type: Mammal

Diet: Carnivore

Average life span in the wild: 35 to 50 years

Size: 13 to 20 ft (4 to 6.1 m)

Weight: 2,000 to 3,000 pounds (907 to 1,361 kilograms)

Group name: Pod

Protection status: Threatened

Did you know? Unlike most other whales, the beluga has a flexible neck that enables it to turn its head in all directions.

These whales are common in the Arctic Ocean’s coastal waters, though they are found in subarctic waters as well. Arctic belugas migrate southward in large herds when the sea freezes over. Animals trapped by Arctic ice often die, and they are prey for polar bears, killer whales, and for Arctic people. They are hunted by indigenous people of the north, and by commercial fisheries that brought some populations, such as those in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, to near collapse.

Beluga feed on fish, crustaceans, and worms. The whale is related to the tusked “unicorn” whale known as the narwhal.

{x}

[fencehopping]

Coral: flowers of the ocean.

[nectarinies]

Holy shit