High seas and deep oceans photos
Photo options (priority ones highlighted – others if there is space):
The water column
The idea here is something of a photo story to get across the concept of the liquid habitat of the pelagic ocean and the
change of species with depth. Any number of photos could be used but I think the anchors are laid out below, and there is
a wealth of material on naturepl.com
The air-water interface – albatross
Whales – air breathing, but traversing to the depths with species such as the sperm whale diving to 3000m
Surface water predators – shark, tuna or billfish
Zooplankton – perhaps some mention of migrating up and down each day, showing strange life-forms (jellyfish,
crustaceans, squid?)
Very deep sea – weird fish.
Cold-water coral reefs
NOAA photo library
The Life on the Edge 2004 mission has collected a diverse array of invertebrate life around deep-sea
corals. Squat lobsters are just one of the many types of organisms that use deep-sea corals for shelter.
Image ID: expl0436, Voyage To Inner Space - Exploring the Seas With NOAA Collect
Location: North Carolina Continental Slope
Photographer: Dr. Ken Sulak, USGS
Credit: Life on the Edge 2004 Expedition: NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration
Caption about challenges of sampling at depth
NOAA photo library
The submersible's manipulator arm collecting a crab trap containing five galatheid crabs. This is an eel
trap that has been modified to better catch deep sea fauna. Life on the Edge 2005 Expedition.
Image ID: expl0511, Voyage To Inner Space - Exploring the Seas With NOAA Collect
Location: Offshore North Carolina
Photo Date: 2005 October 19
Credit: Content provider: Dr. Steve Ross, UNC-W. NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration.
Volcanic vents
Ideal would be a single image to show both the fantastic volcanic vents plus the
abundance of adjacent life. This may be impossible in which case I think a pair might be
necessary.
Tubeworms around volcanic vents.
NOAA
NOAA
Vent communities
Image ID: expl0085, Voyage To Inner Space - Exploring the Seas With NOAA
Collect
Location: Mariana Arc region, Western Pacific Ocean
Photo Date: 2004 April
Credit: Pacific Ring of Fire 2004 Expedition. NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration; Dr.
Bob Embley, NOAA PMEL, Chief Scientist
Pacific Ring of Fire Expedition. White smoky vent fluid rises out of small sulfur chimneys at Northwest
Eifuku volcano. This area was named Champagne vent because bubbles of liquid CO2 were rising out of
the seafloor.
Image ID: expl0068, Voyage To Inner Space - Exploring the Seas With NOAA Collect
Location: Mariana Arc region, Western Pacific Ocean
Photo Date: 2004 April
Credit: Pacific Ring of Fire 2004 Expedition. NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration; Dr. Bob Embley, NOAA
PMEL, Chief Scientist
Seamount images?
We could probably forgo an image of a seamount if short of space, but two options below
Many fish living in deeper waters are long-lived and slow to reproduce – for example the
orange roughy takes 20 years to reach sexual maturity and may live for 100 years or
more. It just takes a few fishing trips to decimate a healthy stock of these fish from a
seamount, but will take many decades to restore them.
[or “would you eat a fish older than your grandmother?]
http://www.marinephotobank.org/secure/gallery-photo.php?photo_id=3570
or
Pacific Ring of Fire Expedition. This pinnacle rises to 167 meters below the surface. The coiled up pink
masses are basket sea stars (about 50 cm across). A myriad of small fish, probably wrasses, swarm around
the top of Pinnacle Cone. Turbulence around the top of the structure attracts all the suspension feeders
who feed on plankton.
Image ID: expl0093, Voyage To Inner Space - Exploring the Seas With NOAA Collect
Location: Mariana Arc region, Western Pacific Ocean
Photo Date: 2004 April
Credit: Pacific Ring of Fire 2004 Expedition. NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration; Dr. Bob Embley, NOAA
PMEL, Chief Scientist