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Tale of extreme sealife should inspire wonder and protection
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THE international hunt for the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 has directed our attention to a part of Earth a typical urbanite scarcely notices or considers: The deep sea.
Following initial twists and turns, the latest search is now focused on a patch of south Indian Ocean nearly 2,000 km west of Perth, Australia, where the depth ranges from 5,000 to 6,000 meters.
It’s difficult to imagine the vastness and depth of the ocean. In their “The Extreme Life of the Sea,” marine biologist Stephen R. Palumbi and his son, writer Anthony R. Palumbi, introduce us to the extreme environment under the waves.
Highlighting the strangest cases of marine life, the authors give us a hint of the ocean’s robust yet fragile ecosystems.
By demonstrating how each creature is tightly adapted to its specialized ecological niche under the sea, the authors persuasively make the case that the smallest human-wrought change can result in irreparable damage to the delicate ecosystem.
Part of our wonder is inspired by the sheer, inconceivable size of the ocean.
As the book begins, standing on a beach and staring out toward the horizon, you can see around 10-20 square miles of ocean surface in good weather — a fairly large habitat by most wildlife standards.
“But the global ocean is actually 10 million times the size of your view out to the horizon, and on average there are more than two miles of water under every square foot of surface,” the authors write.
The book’s goal is to illuminate the amazing diversity of the species that have adapted marvelously well to the extreme conditions down below. Hopefully, awareness of this diversity will inspire more conscious protection efforts.
The book skillfully suggests the diversity of the marine creatures in superlative categories: the earliest, the deepest, the oldest, the fastest, and so on.
In Chapter 4, “The Deepest: High pressure and low food supply make for a difficult daily life,” for instance, we can understand why it is so difficult to salvage the debris and black boxes from the missing aircraft even if their location has been determined.
The abyss
“The deepest reaches of the sea really are akin to another planet, subject to conditions unimaginable on Earth’s surface. Crushing pressure, deep cold, and eternal darkness rule the world’s basement,” the book observes. On page 55 is a picture comparing a simple polystyrene foam cup and another cup that has been taken into the deep sea strapped to the hull of a submarine.
The drastically and permanently shrunken cup attests to the crushing effects of high pressure.
And there is no light. In this abyssal deep of darkness, there can be no sea life that can live off plants that can trap solar energy through photosynthesis.
Instead, giant worms have evolved to dine on bacteria living in and around hydrothermal vents. These bacteria have mastered the art of chemosynthesis: the conversion of the chemical energy of hydrogen sulfide into raw cellular energy.
Stunted by cold and deprivation, most deep sea organisms grow slowly, but these hydrothermal vents catalyze spectacular growth at Earth’s most inclement sites. Although more than 500 new species have been identified to live off the hydrothermal vents, chemosynthesis alone does not account for deep sea bio-diversity.
Some animals are fed by the riotous productivity of the sunlit layers thousands of feet above, in the form of surface-water detritus, flakes of tissue, pieces of algae, and fecal matter. As the descent can take two weeks, much of the material is consumed before it reaches the bottom.
There is also the occasional bonanza for the denizens of the deep, like a dead whale that strikes the muddy sea bottom with a gurgling thump, providing a community of scavengers a feast that can last for years.
“Scientists estimate that more than a half-million whale falls exist in the planet’s oceans at any given time, deposited every few miles along the biggest migration routes,” the Palumbis claim.
The decrease in the number of whale falls — as a result of hunting or deteriorating environment — means fewer whale falls today than in the past, and deep sea famine.
In their delightful, vivid description about the struggle for existence in the sea, the Palumbis do manage to communicate a vital message: even the extreme conditions in the deep sea are not immune from disruptive and destructive human greed.
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