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synchronised behaviour on Earth (Credit: Naturepl.com/Jurgen Freund)","SynopsisShort":"The biggest orgy on earth is triggered by moonlight [Credit: Naturepl.com/Jurgen Freund]","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/5c/qb/p05cqbp7.jpg","Title":"Coral spawning","CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p05cqbp7","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p05cqbp7","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p05cqbp7","_id":"5a40c657b22216e32f356c1b"}],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":[{"Content":{"AssetImage":null,"Description":"","Email":[],"Links":null,"Name":"Michelle Douglass","PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","CreationDateTime":"2014-10-17T10:12:52Z","Entity":"author","Guid":"06a588df-1ad4-480f-993f-86135b87f845","Id":"wwearth/author/michelle-douglass","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T09:03:31.576393Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"michelle-douglass"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2014-10-17T10:12:52Z","Entity":"author","Guid":"06a588df-1ad4-480f-993f-86135b87f845","Id":"wwearth/author/michelle-douglass","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T09:03:31.576393Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"michelle-douglass"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:author:wwearth/author/michelle-douglass","_id":"5a3ce0b3b22216e32f316af7"}],"BodyHtml":"<p>Moonlight triggers the world’s biggest orgy, strange creatures emerge from the depths, and waves glow blue. Some phenomena in the ocean can only be witnessed after dark.</p><p><strong>1. Bioluminescence makes the sea shimmer</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p05cq9pg\"}}</p><p>You may have seen the pictures.</p><p>It’s night-time in an impossibly exotic location. Waves are breaking on the beach. The water is sparkling with electric blue lights. </p><p>The internet loves an image of a magical-looking bioluminescent bay. You may also have seen travel bloggers bemoaning the real event as not quite living up the hype.</p><p>Even if the latter is true, bioluminescence (in this case usually caused by planktonic organisms called dinoflagellates) is a pretty amazing natural phenomenon.</p><p>Dinoflagellates emit blue light when disturbed, which is why they can be seen sparkling over wave crests, around boats or when a hand or paddle runs through them.</p><p>These tiny creatures are the most common source of bioluminescence at the ocean’s surface.</p><p>So-called bioluminescent bays such as in Puerto Rico and Jamaica are among the best-known places to witness the glow. However, the ephemeral phenomenon can be found throughout the ocean where there are dense gatherings of dinoflagellates.</p><p>Sometimes dinoflagellates’ population increases rapidly causing blooms, which by day are coloured a less attractive red-brown, sometimes known as red tides. And some, but not all, of these red tides are poisonous. </p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p05cpysq\"}}</p><p>Even stranger and rarer than bioluminescent bays are “milky seas”, where continually glowing water stretches for as far as the eye can see.</p><p>Milky seas have only been seen a few hundred times since 1915, mainly concentrated around north-western Indian Ocean and near Java, Indonesia.</p><p>They are not caused by dinoflagellates, but are thought to be the result of “bioluminescent bacteria that have accumulated in large numbers near the surface”, explains to Dr Matt Davis, Assistant Professor of Biology, St. Cloud State University in the US, who specialises in bioluminescence.</p><p>Reports by sailors over the centuries have described milky seas as a nocturnal whitish glow like a field of snow, but scientists have had little chance to investigate the phenomenon first-hand.</p><p>In 2005, researchers analysing archived satellite images <a title=\"PNAS article: Detection of a bioluminescent milky sea from space\" href=\"http://www.pnas.org/content/102/40/14181.full\">found that milky seas could be seen from space</a> and that one satellite had captured images of a huge area of ocean that had displayed the strange glow for three consecutive nights a decade earlier. </p><p><strong>2. Animals glow in the dark</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p05cqb74\"}}</p><p>Bioluminescence, the emission of visible light by an organism as the result of a natural chemical reaction, is common among marine life such as fishes, squid and molluscs. In the deep sea most species are bioluminescent, where it is the main source of light.</p><p>In shallower waters, most bioluminescent fish display their lights at night.</p><p>“Flashlight fishes have a specialized pouch under their eye that they can rotate to expose the light emitted from these bacteria, and they use this glow at night to hunt for food and communicate,” says Dr Matt Davis.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p05cqds2\"}}</p><p>Ponyfish emit light from the bioluminescent bacteria housed in a pouch using transparent muscular shutters, to communicate, he explains.</p><p>Camouflage, defence and predation are among the variety of reasons fishes are thought to emit light. </p><p>For example, bobtail squid have an ingenious way of using lights. These nocturnal animals have a mutually beneficial relationship with luminescing bacteria that live in a mantel cavity on its underside. <a title=\"Full study: Counterillumination in the Hawaiian bobtail squid, Euprymna scolopes Berry (Mollusca: Cephalopoda)\" href=\"https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00227-003-1285-3\">At night the squid control the intensity of this light to match the moonlight</a>, and can reduce their silhouette to camouflage themselves from predators.</p><p><strong>3. Moonlight triggers the planet’s biggest orgy</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p05cqbp7\"}}</p><p>There is nothing more romantic than a moonlit night, especially if you are a coral on the Great Barrier Reef off Australia.</p><p>One night a year in spring, the biggest orgy on earth is triggered by lunar light.</p><p>Over 130 coral species simultaneously release their eggs and sperm into the water during a window of just 30-60 minutes.</p><p>This mass spawning event might be the most extraordinary example of synchronised behaviour in the natural world.</p><p>When the gametes – eggs and sperm cells - are released they hover for a moment, forming a ghostly replica of the reef’s shape, before dispersing into an underwater blizzard as the sperm fertilise the eggs.</p><p>Dr Oren Levy, a marine biologist and ecologist and Professor of Life Sciences at Bar-Ilan University, Israel, has studied this extraordinary event.</p><p>“This is really fascinating phenomena…we know this event is going to happen a few nights after November's full moon each year, three to five [days] post full moon,” he says.</p><p>“[It is] always amazing, in particular I am so amazed how each of the coral species year after year spawn at the same hour of the night.”</p><p>He adds: ”Once it happens it is always so exciting to see how everything is becoming so live and synchronised. It is almost [a] spiritual event and you understand the power of nature in its best.”</p><p>Moonlight triggers the phenomenon by acting as a synchroniser or “alarm” probably with other environmental signals such as sunset timings, water temperature and tides to cue the time of the gamete [egg and sperm cells] release, explains Dr Levy.</p><p>He adds that corals seem to possess photoreceptors that detect the phases of the moon, which helps with the “fine tuning” of the gamete release.</p><p><strong>4. Sharks and seals rely on celestial light</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p05cqccw\"}}</p><p>For some seals, moonlit nights spell danger.</p><p>During winter months, the 60,000 cape fur seals on Sea Island in False Bay, South Africa run the gauntlet of being picked off by great white sharks patrolling the seas when they enter and exit the water.</p><p><a title=\"Effects of lunar phase on predator-prey interactions between white shark (Carcharodon carcharias) and Cape fur seals (Arctocephalus pusillus pusillus)\" href=\"https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10641-016-0515-8\" target=\"_self\">One study in 2016 </a>hypothesised seals swimming at night during a full moon are at more risk of being eaten by a shark since bright moonlight silhouetting them against the surface makes them an easy meal for predators lurking below.</p><p>However, most shark attacks on seals happen just after sunrise. Researchers behind the study, which measured shark attacks at dawn, were surprised to find seals were much less likely to be predated at this time of day if there was a full moon. </p><p>The researchers theorised that lunar illumination combined with emerging sunlight may decrease the stealth ability of the sharks and that the advantage switched from sharks to seals as night turned to day.</p><p>And seals may rely on another celestial feature to navigate - the stars.</p><p><a title=\"BBC News: Hungry seals 'steer by the stars'\" href=\"http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7532867.stm\" target=\"_self\">Captive harbour seals (Phoca vitulina) are able to locate a single lodestar and steer by it</a>, researchers have shown.</p><p>During a test using a simulated night sky, seals swam towards the brightest star and could orientate themselves when the stars were swivelled around.</p><p>In the wild, seals need to navigate the open ocean to find foraging grounds that may be separated by hundreds of kilometres.</p><p>Researcher <a title=\"BBC News story: Hungry seals 'steer by the stars'\" href=\"http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7532867.stm\" target=\"_self\">Dr Bjorn Mauck said at the time</a>: \"Seals might learn the position of the stars relative to foraging grounds during dawn and dusk when they can see both the stars and landmarks at the coast.\"</p><p><strong>5. Strange animals come to the surface every night</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p05cqd4r\"}}</p><p>Under the cover of darkness rarely seen creatures migrate to the ocean’s surface to feed.</p><p>The Humboldt squid, also known as the jumbo squid, is one of the most eye-catching marine animals you can see lurking in surface waters.<br />By day the squid lurk in the deep waters of the Eastern Pacific Ocean along the deep shelf that runs off the west coast of the Americas and every night they are one of the many ocean animals to migrate upwards to find dinner.</p><p>Vertical (or diel) migration - when ocean animals swim to the surface at dusk and disappear down again at dawn – is extremely common.</p><p>“What [Humbioldt squid are] doing largely is following their main food item, which is the so-called lantern fish,” explains Professor Paul Rodhouse, an Emeritus Fellow for the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) and former head of the organisation’s biological sciences division.</p><p>In turn, lantern fish follow vertically migrating zooplankton.</p><p>Since zooplankton are depended on by so many ocean animals, “the rest of the food chain will be following on after it,” says Prof Rodhouse.</p><p>“It is a huge movement of biomass every day,” says Prof Rodhouse. “More than a thousand metres. Some of the oceanic squid probably migrate over 1000m every day.”</p><p>He adds that almost all pelagic species (animals that live in the water column not near the bottom or shore) that can swim make the journey.</p><p>Humboldt squid are among the most striking creatures to surface every night. Their ability to change colour and flash bright red when agitated has earned them the nickname “red devils”. Although much smaller than their cousin, the 13m-giant squid, they can reach a length of about 1.5m (almost 5ft). Highly aggressive predators, they capture prey with strong tentacles and suckers and tear into it with powerful beaks, and have reportedly occasionally attacked humans.</p><p>But even ferocious Humboldts are preyed upon by bigger predators such as billfish, swordfish and sharks.</p><p>“Of course what they are all doing [by being active at night] is avoiding predation by the top predators,” says Prof Rodhouse. \"The big predators that are visual predators and which stay in the surface waters and see their prey.”</p><p>“So they’re all… reducing the risk of being preyed on by going down into deep, dark waters at night.”</p><p><em>For more incredible ocean stories, follow <a title=\"Our Blue Planet on Twitter\" href=\"https://twitter.com/OurBluePlanet\">OurBluePlanet</a> on Twitter. Get in touch with to share your most magical ocean moments, and for inspiration <a title=\"Our Blue Planet Youtube video\" href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryM_spHroC0\">watch the launch video on the BBC Earth YouTube Channel</a>.</em></p><p><em>#OurBluePlanet is a collaboration between <a title=\"BBC Earth\" href=\"http://www.bbc.com/earth/uk\" target=\"_self\">BBC Earth</a> and <a title=\"Alucia Productions\" href=\"https://aluciaproductions.com/\" target=\"_self\">Alucia Productions</a>.</em></p><p><em>Join the #EarthCapture underwater film and photo challenge by uploading your shots here:</em></p><p><em><iframe src=\"http://bbcearth.uploader.seenit.io/?projectid=underwater\" width=\"98%\" height=\"650px\" scrolling=\"no\"></iframe></em></p><p><em>Never miss a moment. Sign-up now for the <a title=\"BBC Earth newsletter registration form\" href=\"http://pages.s6.exacttarget.com/page.aspx?QS=773ed3059447707dc886c515d1ff5a33ac4c04337acad3b65cdf6bea5f69f255\" target=\"_self\">BBC Earth newsletter</a>.</em></p>","BusinessUnit":"public service","CalloutBody":"","CalloutPosition":"","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"","Campaign":null,"Collection":null,"DisableAdverts":false,"DisplayDate":"2017-08-18T12:16:04.621Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"The ocean is a strange place after dark","HeadlineShort":"The ocean is a strange place after dark","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"The ocean is a strange place after dark","IsSyndicated":false,"Latitude":"","Location":null,"Longitude":"","Option":null,"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Programme":null,"RelatedStory":[{"Content":{"AssetCustom":"","AssetIbroadcast":null,"AssetImage":[{"Content":{"Copyright":"Anders Nyberg","FileSizeBytes":1973195,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":2772,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/live-galileo-interface-mt-resources-imagebucket-1a92e5tj3b5d6/p0/4y/yt/p04yytzj.jpg","SourceWidth":4928,"SynopsisLong":"","SynopsisMedium":"A British WWII BSA M20 motorbike in the hold of the Thistlegorm, which lies off Egypt in the Red Sea. 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Credit: Anders Nyberg","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/4y/yt/p04yytzj.jpg","Title":"Picture 6_British World War II BSA M20 motorbike_ed@AndersNyberg.jpg","CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p04yytzj","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p04yytzj","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p04yytzj","_id":"5a4427e6b22216e32f372c80"}],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":[{"Content":{"Copyright":"Anders Nyberg","FileSizeBytes":1007452,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":2772,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/live-galileo-interface-mt-resources-imagebucket-1a92e5tj3b5d6/p0/4y/yt/p04yytng.jpg","SourceWidth":4928,"SynopsisLong":"","SynopsisMedium":"The Giannis D wreck off Egypt: \"One of the most attractive backgrounds for a photo taken inside a wreck are lightbeams shining in through portholes.\" (Credit: Anders Nyberg)","SynopsisShort":"The Giannis D wreck off Egypt, in the Red Sea. Credit: Anders Nyberg","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/4y/yt/p04yytng.jpg","Title":"Picture 5_Lightbeams shining in through portholes_ed@AndersNyberg.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p04yytng","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p04yytng","_id":"5a4427e7b22216e32f372c81"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"Anders Nyberg","FileSizeBytes":1360339,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":3132,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/live-galileo-interface-mt-resources-imagebucket-1a92e5tj3b5d6/p0/4y/yv/p04yyvkv.jpg","SourceWidth":5568,"SynopsisLong":"","SynopsisMedium":"The SS Hornstein was a German cargo steamer that ran aground in the Baltic Sea in 1905. 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(Credit: Steve Jones/www.millionfish.com)","SynopsisShort":"Credit: Steve Jones www.millionfish.com","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/4x/l9/p04xl9rj.jpg","Title":"Steve Jones HMS Audacious"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p04xl9rj","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p04xl9rj","_id":"5a449c29b22216e32f376993"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"Anders Nyberg","FileSizeBytes":1973195,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":2772,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/https://s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/live-galileo-interface-mt-resources-imagebucket-1a92e5tj3b5d6/p0/4y/yt/p04yytzj.jpg","SourceWidth":4928,"SynopsisLong":"","SynopsisMedium":"A British WWII BSA M20 motorbike in the hold of the Thistlegorm, which lies off Egypt in the Red Sea. (Credit: Anders Nyberg)","SynopsisShort":"A British WWII BSA M20 motorbike in the hold of the Thistlegorm. Credit: Anders Nyberg","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/4y/yt/p04yytzj.jpg","Title":"Picture 6_British World War II BSA M20 motorbike_ed@AndersNyberg.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p04yytzj","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p04yytzj","_id":"5a4427e6b22216e32f372c80"}],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":[{"Content":{"AssetImage":null,"Description":"","Email":[],"Links":null,"Name":"Michelle Douglass","PrimaryVertical":"wwearth"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2014-10-17T10:12:52Z","Entity":"author","Guid":"06a588df-1ad4-480f-993f-86135b87f845","Id":"wwearth/author/michelle-douglass","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T09:03:31.576393Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"michelle-douglass"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:author:wwearth/author/michelle-douglass","_id":"5a3ce0b3b22216e32f316af7"}],"BodyHtml":"<p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04xl4by\"}}</p><p>Last year, British photographer <strong><a href=\"http://millionfish.com/\">Steve Jones</a></strong> shot the well-preserved wreck of the World War Two US bomber B-17G Flying Fortress off the island of Vis, Croatia. The aircraft crashed in 1944 after getting hit by anti-aircraft fire, killing co-pilot, Ernest Vienneau.</p><blockquote><p> “In years to come, many of the ships and aircraft lost during the World Wars will be gone forever.” </p></blockquote><p>Diving such sites can be both “exhilarating and spectacular” and “sombre and sad” when there has been loss of life, says Jones; something that hit home particularly hard on this shoot.</p><p>The images Jones captured ended up having a surprisingly personal impact after he entered the photographs in the Underwater Photographer of the Year awards. His entry was published and spotted by the late co-pilot's family who got in touch with Jones.</p><p>“They had never seen images of his resting place,” says Jones. “The follow-on correspondence meant even more to me than the dive itself.”</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04xl9rj\"}}</p><p>“From descending into the massive cylindrical turret armour of the WW1 Battleship HMS Audacious, to seeing the deck of the WW2 wreck SS Empire Heritage covered in Sherman tanks, I’m frequently left in awe of what I’ve seen,” he says.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04xmzh9\"}}</p><p>But these relics from one of the bloodiest chapters in human history are slowly disappearing.</p><p>“In years to come many of the ships and aircraft lost during the World Wars will be gone forever,” says Jones.</p><p>Since wrecks deteriorate over time, he says, photographing them is “capturing a point in history that will never be seen again”.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04yytng\"}}</p><blockquote><p> “Underwater photography and scuba diving is a form of meditation.” </p></blockquote><p>“When you dive on a wreck that has lain on the seabed, sometimes over a hundred years, it's like time stood still,” says <a href=\"http://www.worldoceanphoto.com/\"><strong>Anders Nyberg</strong></a>, a freelance photographer from the Swedish island of Gotland.</p><p>His favourite technique is to showcase familiar objects in the strange, other-worldly setting of the deep.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04yytzj\"}}</p><p>“It may be a door handle, a vase or a binocular, furniture or a wall with a tool that hangs neatly left on the wall. It is so I like it, untouched, to get the best pictures,” he says.</p><p>Wreck sites like the SS Thistlegorm, one of the world’s best-known wrecks, are among his favourite to photograph, as the area’s diverse marine life and beautiful corals make rich, wide-angle photography subjects.</p><p>Nyberg’s most startling experience, though, was not one he managed to capture on camera.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04yyvkv\"}} </p><p>He and his wife were diving SS President Coolidge, which sank in 1942 off the island Esparto Santo, Vanuatu, when the cargo rooms became flooded with blue flashing lights.</p><p>“Slowly we were totally surrounded by this glitter and I became completely disorientated,” he says.</p><p>The peculiar blue lights turned out to be the biolumiscent eyes of a school of fish. The phenomenon – thought to attract or illuminate prey – can only be seen in total darkness, so turning on a torch would have stopped the effect.</p><p>Nyberg’s advice for getting the perfect underwater shot is to master your diving and camera equipment before going into the water. For safety it is important to use a line to follow out, in case visibility is poor.</p><p>Diving on wrecks is both exciting and physically and mentally demanding, but it can also be “a form of meditation, to relax from the stress of everyday life and work”.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04yz1yn\"}}</p><p>Photographer, designer, and author, <a href=\"http://www.theunderwaterdesigner.com/\"><strong>Jennifer Idol</strong></a> is the first woman to dive 50 states in her native US.</p><p>“I particularly enjoy large intact wrecks that are historic and not artificial reefs. Each wreck tells a story,” Idol says.</p><p>She describes her experience photographing the U-352 in North Carolina – a WW2 German submarine sunk by the US Coast Guard Cutter Icarus, which rests at 35m (115 feet) below the surface.</p><p>“It feels like descending through time until you reach a boat much smaller than you expect.”</p><p>To take successful photographs, Idol advises focusing on recognisable features of the wreck.</p><blockquote><p> “Wrecks easily appear abstract and unidentifiable.” </p></blockquote><p>“Wrecks easily appear abstract and unidentifiable,” she explains.</p><p>“The bow and stern are obvious exterior shots while a conning tower, wheelhouse, or unique feature to a wreck will work on the interior. Using models in an image helps show the scale of a wreck.”</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04yz2jl\"}}</p><p>Creating a powerful image takes planning. Idol says it is important photographers consider “orientation, condition, and depth” before a shoot.</p><p>“A ship can be too large to see on one dive, especially when setting up a photo. Usually, descent lines are set in place or boats are moored to a line from which you follow to the wreck.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04yz2gb\"}}</p><p>“If you are creating images inside the wreck, it is important to first become familiar with the wreck and then also to follow necessary diving procedures for penetration. This may include setting lines or diving mixed gases and using redundant diving systems.”</p><p>Even to someone as experienced as Idol, wrecks can yield surprises.</p><p>“I am sometimes surprised to find schools of fish, invertebrates, and even eels deep inside wrecks,” she says. “The life inside a wreck is surprising because it feels remote, is dark, and evades currents.”</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04yz06z\"}}</p><blockquote><p> “It is very nice…to see how the sea makes from a huge piece of steel a new house for fishes” </p></blockquote><p>“It’s very special to feel you are in a place where some years ago there was people cruising the seas on it. I can imagine a lot of stories about it,” says <a href=\"http://www.jordibenitez.com/\"><strong>Jordi Benitez</strong></a>, a banker from Spain who started in underwater photography 12 years ago.</p><p>“It is very nice too, to see how the sea makes from a huge piece of steel a new house for fishes, and how a new ecosystem is created around the wreck.”</p><p>Benitez’ subjects have included the Dragonera in Tarragona – a large ship sunk in the 1990s as an underwater tourism attraction – and in the Red Sea the Chrisoula K and Thistlegorm. The former is a cargo ship that struck a reef and sank in the 1980s, and the latter a British wartime ship that was attacked and sunk in 1941, killing nine people. The Thistlegorm wreck was discovered in the 1950s.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04yz0c2\"}}</p><p>“I love to dive in the SS Thistlegorm because there are still a lot of materials from WW2,” says Benitez. “You can see bikes, trucks, trains, wings of planes... You feel as [though] you were travelling 70 years back.”</p><p>His advice for capturing effective underwater photographs is to use a “very wide-angle lens” and to “play with the light”.</p><p>“In underwater photography, we use many times strobes and artificial light, but in wrecks, it’s very nice to play with natural light, this gives also a special atmosphere to the pictures.”</p><p><em>For more incredible ocean stories, follow <a title=\"Twitter: OurBluePlanet\" href=\"https://twitter.com/OurBluePlanet\" target=\"_self\">OurBluePlanet</a> on Twitter. Get in touch with to share your most magical ocean moments, and for inspiration <a title=\"BBC Earth YouTube: Love the Ocean? Launch video\" href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryM_spHroC0\" target=\"_self\">watch the launch video on the BBC Earth YouTube Channel</a>.</em></p><p><em>#OurBluePlanet is a collaboration between <a title=\"BBC Earth\" href=\"http://www.bbc.com/\" target=\"_self\">BBC Earth</a> and <a title=\"Alucia Productions\" href=\"http://aluciaproductions.com/\" target=\"_self\">Alucia Productions</a>.</em></p><p>Join the #EarthCapture underwater film and photo challenge by uploading your shots here:</p><p><iframe src=\"http://bbcearth.uploader.seenit.io/?projectid=underwater\" width=\"98%\" height=\"650px\" scrolling=\"no\"></iframe></p><p><em>Never miss a moment. Sign-up now for the <a href=\"http://pages.s6.exacttarget.com/page.aspx?QS=773ed3059447707dc886c515d1ff5a33ac4c04337acad3b65cdf6bea5f69f255\">BBC Earth newsletter</a>.</em></p>","BusinessUnit":"public service","CalloutBody":"<p><strong>1. Respect War Graves</strong><br />Treat wrecks with the respect you would give a churchyard.</p>\n<p><strong>2. Respect the Wreck Environment</strong><br />Treat them with the care you would give to coral reefs.</p>\n<p><strong>3. Respect the Future</strong><br />Take photos rather than souvenirs.</p>\n<p><strong>4. Respect Our History</strong><br />If you find anything, report it to the Receiver of Wreck.</p>\n<p><strong>5. Respect Yourself</strong><br />Make sure that you are appropriately trained for safe wreck diving.</p>\n<p><strong>6. Respect Your Family and Friends</strong><br />Some wrecks contain dangerous cargoes or live munitions – don't disturb them.</p>\n<p><strong>7. Respect the Law<br /></strong>Know and respect maritime laws – and avoid a criminal record.</p>\n<p><em>Source: <a href=\"file:///web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://f/Our%20Blue%20Planet/Respect_our_wrecks-3(1).pdf\">British Sub-Aqua Club</a></em></p>","CalloutPosition":"middle","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"Wreck diving etiquette","Campaign":null,"Collection":[{"Content":{"AssetImage":[],"Campaign":null,"CollectionOverrides":null,"CollectionType":"column","Description":"This is your chance to join the BBC Earth Capture community and tell your stories on BBC Earth.","Name":"Earth Capture","Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Title":"Earth Capture","CreationDateTime":"2015-08-31T16:08:19.672121Z","Entity":"collection","Guid":"a3cb37f3-f91e-4a7b-a295-19899f9faf6b","Id":"wwearth/column/earth-capture","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T15:01:40.136271Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"column/earth-capture"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2015-08-31T16:08:19.672121Z","Entity":"collection","Guid":"a3cb37f3-f91e-4a7b-a295-19899f9faf6b","Id":"wwearth/column/earth-capture","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T15:01:40.136271Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"column/earth-capture"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:collection:wwearth/column/earth-capture","_id":"5a3ce0b7b22216e32f31707a"}],"DisableAdverts":false,"DisplayDate":"2017-05-30T08:35:07Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"Eerie underwater scenes of lost ship and aircraft wrecks","HeadlineShort":"The eerie beauty of lost shipwrecks","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"Divers share their most mesmerising shots of the lost ships and aircraft that rest on the ocean floor","IsSyndicated":false,"Latitude":"","Location":null,"Longitude":"","Option":null,"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Programme":null,"RelatedStory":[{"Content":{"AssetCustom":"","AssetIbroadcast":null,"AssetImage":[],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":[],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":[],"BodyHtml":"<p>BBC Culture is partnering with Magnum Photos, the international photographer’s co-operative, for its annual awards, which open today. Any photographer – professional or amateur – interested in entering can apply <a href=\"https://www.lensculture.com/magnum-photography-awards-2017\">here</a>: the competition closes on 16 May, and winners will be announced on 18 July. The competition will once more be hosted through LensCulture, and this year’s jury includes Magnum photographers David Hurn, Susan Meiselas and Alec Soth, as well as National Geographic Magazine’s director of photography Sarah Leen.</p><p>We’ll be sharing outstanding submissions on Facebook throughout the competition – to see them, <a href=\"https://www.facebook.com/BBCCulture/\">like our page</a> if you don’t already. Once it’s over, we will publish a series of features on selected winners. In addition, all the winners, finalists and jurors’ picks will be digitally exhibited at the Photographers’ Gallery in London. To celebrate the launch of the competition, we’ve picked images from winners and finalists last year. <strong>Warning: some of the images may cause distress.</strong></p><p><strong>Liquid Mountains of Lake Erie by Dave Sandford </strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04ynzkd\"}}</p><p>Dave Sandford has christened the waves he’s captured on camera with imposing names such as The Punisher, The Sandstorm and Bane of the Great Lakes. This one is called Lake of the Cat: Sandford shot his images on Lake Erie in Ontario, which takes its name from a native tribal word <em>erige</em> (cat) because of its unpredictable nature. “When the violent wind storms of Lake Erie whip up, the lake becomes like a giant washing machine,” says Sandford. “There is no pattern, like the swell from ocean waves. These waves move in almost any and every direction.”</p><p>The Canadian photographer – a finalist in the 2016 Magnum Awards – visited the lake throughout the autumn months, sometimes for eight hours a day, sustaining wind speeds of up to 65 mph (100 km/h). Wave heights reached 25 feet (7.6m). “It is on days like these that most people stay away from the lake. But it is days like these when Erie comes alive, showing its true power. These are the days I can’t wait to get to the lake and create my images.”</p><p>His images have also helped others who work on the lake to connect with it in a new way. “I have had a number of people contact me about my work, including ship captains of 40 years, fishermen who spent their career on the lakes, and those who grew up on the shores. All of them tell me the same thing: they thank me for capturing the raw, violent power that the lake displays.”</p><p><strong>Otsuchi Future Memories by Alejandro Chaskielberg</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04ynz3r\"}}</p><p>Another project – chosen by Magnum Photos president Martin Parr in the jurors’ picks category – reveals the power of waves in a haunting way. Imbued with watery tints, as though they themselves have been washed away, the photos of Alejandro Chaskielberg show inhabitants of Otsuchi Town, Iwate Prefecture a year and a half after the massive tsunami of 2011 hit Japan.</p><p>They huddle in family groups of multiple generations or teams of co-workers (including the Second Squad of the Otsuchi Volunteer Fire Department), in the places where they lived or worked before they were destroyed. Other images show waterlogged family albums or single snaps marbled by the sea. In this photo, four members of the same family – Takuji Sasaki, Miyoko Abe, Hitoshi Abe and Nichirou Abe – sit in the ruins of their house that was flooded and then consumed by fire.</p><p><strong>Nilin by Cris Toala Olivares</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04ynz4r\"}}</p><p>Cris Toala Olivares was born in Ecuador and trained in medicine in the Netherlands, but changed profession after feeling that bureaucratic red tape got in the way of offering proper patient care. Since then, he has photographed volcanoes worldwide as well as an intertidal zone on the Dutch, German and Danish coasts. He was a documentary single image winner in the Magnum Awards for something more human: a photo showing Israeli soldiers shooting tear gas during a demonstration against Israel’s separation barrier in the West Bank village of Nilin.</p><p><strong>There Are No Homosexuals in Iran by Laurence Rasti</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04ynz18\"}}</p><p>Swiss photographer Laurence Rasti quotes Mahmoud Ahmadinejad – speaking at Columbia University in 2007 – in the text accompanying her images. “In Iran, we do not have homosexuals like in your country,” said the former Iranian President. In Iran, homosexuality is still punishable by death. “Their only legal options are to leave the country, hide their sexuality, or choose transsexuality, a practice tolerated by law but also considered pathological,” says Rasti.</p><p>She photographed gay Iranian couples in the small town of Denizli in Turkey. “Hundreds of Iranian gay refugees have put their lives on pause while waiting to join a host country where they can freely live their sexualities,” she says, feeling that anonymity was the best protection but offering it in often surprising ways through her photographs. Some are hidden behind veils; others partially obscured by roses. She claims that the series “tries to give back to these people a face that their country has temporarily stolen”.</p><p><strong>Daesh by Asger Ladefoged</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04ynzng\"}}</p><p>Danish photojournalist Asger Ladefoged has covered the terror attacks and the refugee crisis in Europe, as well as conflict in Syria, Iraq and Ukraine. This photo – which was a single image winner in the open category – shows Ahmad, a young man in his early twenties. According to Ladefoged, he is a member of Isis: “In February 2015, Kurdish YPG militia arrested him after he was seen and revealed in their territory in the northeastern part of Syria.”</p><p><strong>Palm Wine Collector, Kunene Region, Namibia by Kyle Weeks</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04ynz8z\"}}</p><p>This photo – a single image winner in the fine art category – shows a Himba man who has selected, prepared and maintains a Makalani palm during the sap-tapping process. According to Namibian photographer Kyle Weeks, “the Himba people from this area have utilised this plant family for generations, passing down the knowledge and technique needed to carry out the process of obtaining the liquid”.</p><p>The tradition runs against recent environmental protection efforts. “Although the Makalani palm is a protected tree in Namibia and the tapping of palms a banned practice, the Ovahimba firmly believe that it is their right to continue,” says Weeks. “They argue against Western law, instead following ancient cultural traditions that respect these palms in their utilisation and in turn promote their conservation on a cultural level.”</p><p><strong>At the Last Second by Valery Melnikov</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04ynzlm\"}}</p><p>The Russian photographer Valery Melnikov was a World Press Photo winner before becoming a photojournalism single image winner in the 2016 Magnum Awards for this photo. He has covered the Chechen war, the conflict between Georgia and South Ossetia, and the Syrian civil war, and began documenting the war in Eastern Ukraine in 2014.</p><p>He took this photo on 2 July 2014, just as two civilians escaped from a fire at a house destroyed by an air attack in Donbass, eastern Ukraine. His current ongoing project, Black Days of Ukraine, is about “ordinary civil people who became the participants of the military confrontation against their will”, and he aims to record “the political and social life of societies in conflict”.</p><p><strong>Refugees by Mauricio Lima</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04ynzg0\"}}</p><p>Brazilian photographer Mauricio Lima found a way to personalise what is considered the biggest human exodus since the end of World War Two, winning the Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Photography. In 2015, he followed the Majid family, after they had left Syria, for 29 days as they travelled through seven countries − from Serbia to Sweden. The resulting project was the documentary series winner in the Magnum Awards, its photos offering glimpses of the realities at each step of the journey.</p><p>In one, adults and children are piled on top of each other as they sleep on a bus floor; another shows Iranian refugees sitting on a rail track in protest after only asylum seekers from Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria were allowed to cross the Greek border into Macedonia. This image captures the struggle as refugees barred from crossing the border try to grab donations of water, blankets and nappies after ten days encamped next to a train station in Idomeni, Greece.</p><p><strong>Fire of Hatred by Asghar Khamseh</strong></p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04ynz9h\"}}</p><p>A finalist in the Magnum Awards, Iranian photographer Asghar Khamseh has created a series of heartbreaking portraits showing the victims of acid attacks. Often taking place in family conflicts – whether rejected marriage proposals, divorce requests or prompted by envy – they aim to create “cultural destitution and intolerance”, according to Khamseh. “In addition to physical and psychological damage, the victims face the experiences of social stigma and blame.”</p><p>In this image, Raana Mehri holds a photo of herself and her mother Somayeh. When Somayeh requested a divorce, her husband threw acid on her face and body as well as on Raana. They were disfigured and both lost their right eyes. Somayeh survived for four years, suffering through numerous operations. In April 2015, due to side effects from the attack, including lung scarring, she died in a Tehran hospital.</p><p><em>One of the images that originally appeared in this story has since been removed due to uncertainty over the age of one of its subjects.</em></p><p><em>If you would like to comment on this story or anything else you have seen on BBC Culture, head over to our </em><a href=\"https://www.facebook.com/pages/BBC-Culture/237388053065908\"><em>Facebook</em></a><em> page or message us on</em> <a href=\"https://twitter.com/bbc_culture\"><em>Twitter</em></a><em>.</em></p><p><em>And if you liked this story, </em><a href=\"http://pages.emails.bbc.com/subscribe/\"><strong>sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter</strong></a><em>, called “If You Only Read 6 Things This Week”. A handpicked selection of stories from BBC Future, Earth, Culture, Capital, Travel and Autos, delivered to your inbox every Friday.</em></p>","BusinessUnit":"worldwide","CalloutBody":"","CalloutPosition":"","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"","Campaign":null,"Collection":null,"DisableAdverts":false,"DisplayDate":"2017-03-31T21:24:51.233Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"Heartstopping photos of beauty, joy and loss","HeadlineShort":"Heartstopping photos of beauty and loss","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"BBC Culture is partnering with Magnum Photos for their second annual photography awards. As the competition opens, we’ve picked previous winning images that reframe the world.","IsSyndicated":true,"Latitude":"","Location":null,"Longitude":"","Option":[],"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwculture","Programme":null,"RelatedStory":null,"RelatedTag":[],"StoryType":"slideshow","SummaryLong":"BBC Culture is partnering with Magnum Photos for their annual photography awards. As the competition opens, we’ve picked previous winning images that reframe the world.","SummaryShort":"Award-winning images that reframe the world","SuperSection":null,"Tag":[]},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2017-04-04T07:15:31.331411Z","Entity":"story","Guid":"1a01d3dc-e43a-49f9-bfc4-556155f8b7d5","Id":"wwculture/story/20170331-ten-heartstopping-photos-of-joy-loss-and-beauty","ModifiedDateTime":"2017-05-04T10:40:02.218773Z","Project":"wwculture","Slug":"20170331-ten-heartstopping-photos-of-joy-loss-and-beauty"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:story:wwculture/story/20170331-ten-heartstopping-photos-of-joy-loss-and-beauty","_id":"5a43ac7bb22216e32f36eccd"},{"Content":{"AssetCustom":"","AssetIbroadcast":null,"AssetImage":[],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":[],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":[],"BodyHtml":"<p>When it set sail on its maiden voyage in 1912, no one could have predicted what the opulent RMS Titanic would look like now – a rusting hulk at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. But at least something remains of the ship, more than a century after its ill-fated transatlantic journey.</p><p>However, scientists believe that in a few decades there may be nothing left of the ship at all, thanks to a species of bacteria which is slowly eating away its iron hull.</p><p>Robert Ballard, an oceanographer at the University of Rhode Island in Narragansett, discovered the wreck of the Titanic in 1985. What was not widely known at the time was that the discovery only came about because of Ballard's involvement in a secret US Navy mission to locate the wrecks of two US nuclear submarines sunk during the Cold War. It just happened that the Titanic was found between the two wrecks.</p><p>At the time of that initial discovery the ship was remarkably preserved. It is 3.8km below the surface, and the <a href=\"http://www.unesco.org/new/fileadmin/MULTIMEDIA/HQ/CLT/pdf/Henrietta_Mann_Paper.pdf\">lack of light and the intense pressures</a> make the area inhospitable to most life, slowing corrosion. Fast-forward 30 years, though, and the hull is rusting away, thanks to metal-munching bacteria. Some researchers now give the shipwreck just <a href=\"http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1346446/Titanic-wreck-completely-destroyed-20-years-new-rust-eating-bacteria.html\">another 14 years before it is gone forever</a>.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04vk91c\"}}</p><p>So what do we know about the microbe that is responsible?</p><p>The story started in 1991 when scientists from Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada collected samples of icicle-like formations of rust – \"rusticles\" – hanging from the ship. They took them back to the lab and saw that they were teeming with life.</p><p>But it was not until 2010 that a separate group of scientists, led by <a href=\"https://www.linkedin.com/in/henrietta-mann-a4a19335\">Henrietta Mann</a> at Dalhousie University, decided to identify what type of life it was.</p><blockquote><p> The hull is rusting away, thanks to metal-munching bacteria </p></blockquote><p>They isolated just one species of bacteria, and it turned out to be brand new to science. Mann and her colleagues named it <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1099/ijs.0.020628-0\"><em>Halomonas titanicae</em></a> after the ship.</p><p>The bacteria can survive in conditions that are completely inhospitable to most lifeforms on Earth: water that is pitch-black and at crushing pressures.</p><p>But it has inherited another, even more astonishing trick. <em>Halomonas</em> bacteria are often found living in another type of extreme environment: salt marshes. Here, the salinity of water can vary dramatically because of evaporation, and <em>Halomonas</em> bacteria have evolved to cope with the problem.</p><p>If the water that bathes cells is too salty, water will rush out of cells, causing them to shrink, collapse and die. However, too little salt can be just as deadly. For instance, red blood cells placed in pure water burst as water floods in.</p><p>Both of these events happen because water \"wants\" to move from an area of high water concentration to an area of low water concentration, a phenomenon known as osmosis.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04vk8xd\"}}</p><p>But what does this mean?</p><p>Salts, sugars and other small molecules all dissolve in water, clogging it up and taking up space, meaning that there is less space for the water itself. When these areas of low water concentration come into contact with pure water, the water will rush in to equalise the balance, in much the same way that warm air rushes out of a house in winter when the door is opened. As cell membranes are permeable to water, this means that all lifeforms are extremely sensitive to external and internal salt levels.</p><blockquote><p> They isolated just one species of bacteria, and it turned out to be brand new to science </p></blockquote><p>To stop their cells from bursting or shrinking, many species produce compounds like sugars or amino acids that keep the concentration of \"stuff\" inside their cells stable relative to the outside, stopping water flooding in or gushing out.</p><p>However, not many organisms can do so to the extent that <em>Halomonas</em> bacteria can. Joe Zaccai at the Institut Laue–Langevin in Grenoble, France is part of an international team of scientists who have <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep31434\">analysed just how the bacteria can survive in such extreme and variable conditions</a>. They found that <em>Halomonas</em> uses a molecule called ectoine to protect itself from osmotic pressure.</p><p>\"If a cell is to survive in a fluctuating salt environment, it must have a way to compensate by adjusting the concentration of its internal solution,\" says Zaccai. \"<em>Halomonas</em> produces ectoine in order to counterbalance the outside osmotic pressure. As the outside salt concentration fluctuates so will the ectoine concentration response.\"</p><p>In other words, the saltier the water gets, the more ectoine the bacteria produce inside their cells to stop water rushing out. However, this adaptation can be highly dangerous for an organism. The more \"stuff\" that accumulates inside a cell, the more it can get in between the water molecules, disrupting water's unique properties.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04vk979\"}}</p><p>The reason that water is so absolutely necessary for life is that the unique bonds between its atoms – known as hydrogen bonds – allow it to act as a solvent. Other chemicals can dissolve in it, and can react together.</p><p>The reactions of life need to take place in a solution, which is why all our cells are bathed in liquid water. What's more, RNA and DNA, the proteins and enzymes responsible for carrying out the daily work of the cell, and the membranes which give them structure, need to be surrounded by a layer of water in order to function.</p><blockquote><p> Microbes colonise a shipwreck almost immediately after the ship comes to rest on the seafloor </p></blockquote><p>This layer of water, known as a \"hydration shell\", is crucial to maintain the correct folding of proteins, and in turn their function. If this was disrupted, then the proteins could unravel and fall apart, which would kill the cell.</p><p>As the bacteria clearly are able to accumulate extremely high concentrations of ectoine inside their cells – the study found that <em>Halomonas</em> produces so much ectoine that it accounts for 20% of the microbe's mass – the molecule must somehow leave these important properties of water in place.</p><p>To investigate how, the scientists led by Zaccai bombarded the bacteria with a beam of neutrons. By looking at the scatter pattern produced by neutrons bouncing off the atoms in the microbe's cell membranes and proteins, the scientists were able to \"look\" at structures at the molecular and atomic level.</p><p>There are few places in the world that are equipped for such experiments. The researchers worked at the Institut Laue Langevin, one of a handful of neutron research centres in the world.</p><p>\"By watching how neutrons were scattered by different samples, we succeeded in determining how ectoine acts on proteins and cell membranes and, most importantly, water,\" says Zaccai. \"Rather than interfering, [ectoine] actually enhances the solvent properties of water that are essential to biology\".</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04vk955\"}}</p><p>It turns out that, no matter how much ectoine there is dissolved inside the cell, the shell of water surrounding proteins and the cell membrane remains 100% water, allowing the cell's metabolism to continue as normal. That is because, when the ectoine forms hydrogen bonds with water, it forms large clusters that will not fit on the surfaces of proteins and membranes, so only pure water can remain.</p><blockquote><p> The shipwreck becomes a kind of artificial reef, home to a plethora of life </p></blockquote><p>Initial investigations of <em>H. titanicae</em> showed it can <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1099/ijs.0.020628-0\">grow in a water with as little as 0.5% weight by volume and as much as 25%</a>, although it does best with a salt concentration between 2% and 8%.</p><p>However, it is not clear how, or if, this salt tolerance has helped it colonise the shipwreck.</p><p><em>H. titanicae</em> is not the only bacteria that loves to inhabit shipwrecks. Various types of microbes colonise a shipwreck almost immediately after the ship comes to rest on the seafloor. They quickly build gooey sticky films over every available surface, called \"biofilms\". These biofilms are like a haven to corals, sponges and molluscs, which in turn attract larger animals.</p><p>Very quickly the shipwreck becomes a kind of artificial reef, home to a plethora of life.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04vk9dc\"}}</p><p>Ancient wooden shipwrecks are set upon by microbes that feed on wood, whilst more modern steel ships attract bacteria like <em>H. titanicae</em>, which love to eat iron. Whilst <em>H. titanicae</em> may eventually destroy the Titanic, many of these bacteria actually protect their ships from corrosion, which is one of the reasons why we still have shipwrecks dating back as far as the 14th Century BC.</p><blockquote><p> Once it hits the floor it becomes available to microbes that rush to cover every surface </p></blockquote><p>In 2014, a team of scientists from the US Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) conducted <a href=\"https://hamdanlab.com/gom-schema/\">perhaps the most in-depth study to date into microbial life on shipwrecks</a>. They looked at eight shipwrecks in the northern Gulf of Mexico. The shipwrecks included wooden-hulled sailing ships dating to the 19th Century, one wooden-hulled sailing ship possibly from as early as the 17th Century, and three World War Two steel-hulled vessels, one of which was sunk by a German U-boat.</p><p>They found that the material the ship was built from was the crucial factor that determined the type of microbe that was attracted to the wreck. Wooden ships were teeming with bacteria that attack and feed on the cellulose, hemicellulose, or lignin found in wood. Steel ships, on the other hand, were occupied mostly by iron-loving bacteria.</p><p>Strangely, although the bacteria were essentially feeding on the ship, they actually served to protect them from corrosion.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04vk9jx\"}}</p><p>\"In essence, what happens is that any vessel that sinks, be it a wooden 19th-Century ship or a steel-hulled ship from World War Two, once it hits the floor it becomes available to microbes that rush to cover every surface,\" says marine archaeologist <a href=\"http://www.anthro.fsu.edu/alumni/melanie-damour\">Melanie Damour</a> at BOEM in New Orleans, Louisiana, one of the expedition's lead scientists.</p><blockquote><p> The 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster spewed millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico </p></blockquote><p>\"At first the ship will begin to corrode as it is in contact with seawater, but as microbes begin to colonise the wreck they begin to form a biofilm, which forms a protective layer between the ship and the seawater,\" says Damour.</p><p>This means that any kind of mechanical impact, such as an anchor dragging across the wreck, will break through that protective crust and open the bare metal to the seawater again, speeding up corrosion.</p><p>It is not just mechanical impact that can speed up the corrosion. The 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster spewed millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, and much of it entered the deep ocean. In laboratory experiments, the team has found that exposure to oil can speed up the corrosion of shipwreck material. This suggests that oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill may be accelerating the corrosion of shipwrecks on the seafloor, but the team have not yet been able to find out if this is really happening. </p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04vk9lt\"}}</p><p>\"Every bacteria, fungus and microbe has a specific function it performs that it has evolved to do over millions of years,\" says Damour.</p><blockquote><p> These shipwrecks are important historical monuments </p></blockquote><p>\"Iron-sulphate-reducing bacteria are attracted to the iron in steel shipwrecks, but others love the hydrocarbons that make up oil, and so these flourished after the 2010 spill. However, we found that not all microbes can handle being exposed to oil and chemical dispersants and some find it extremely toxic. Even four years later, the oil was still present in the environment, and the damaging effect it has on bacteria and biofilms meant the shipwrecks were exposed to seawater and were corroding at a much faster rate.\"</p><p>The finding is alarming. More than 2,000 sunken ships lie on the Gulf's seafloor, including everything from 16th-Century Spanish vessels to the ruins of a World War Two U-boat. These shipwrecks are important historical monuments, which provide unique insight into the past. They also provide a home for deep-sea life.</p><p>But eventually, all the shipwrecks – including Titanic out in the Atlantic – will be eaten away entirely, whether through metal-munching bacteria or seawater corrosion. The iron in the 47,000-tonne vessel will end up in the ocean. Eventually, some of it will be incorporated in the bodies of marine animals and plants. The Titanic will have been recycled.</p><p><em>Join over six million BBC Earth fans by liking us on <a href=\"https://www.facebook.com/bbcearth\" target=\"_blank\">Facebook</a>, or follow us on <a href=\"https://twitter.com/bbcearth\" target=\"_blank\">Twitter</a> and <a href=\"https://instagram.com/bbcearth/\" target=\"_blank\">Instagram</a>.</em></p><p><em>If you liked this story, <a href=\"http://pages.emails.bbc.com/subscribe/?ocid=ear.bbc.email.we.email-signup\" target=\"_blank\">sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter</a> called \"If You Only Read 5 Things This Week\". A handpicked selection of stories from BBC Future, Earth, Culture, Capital and Travel, delivered to your inbox every Friday.</em></p>","BusinessUnit":"worldwide","CalloutBody":"","CalloutPosition":"","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"","Campaign":null,"Collection":[],"DisableAdverts":false,"DisplayDate":"2017-03-10T09:52:19.182Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"The wreck of the Titanic is being eaten and may soon vanish","HeadlineShort":"The wreck of the Titanic is being eaten","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"Some reports suggest the Titanic might disappear within 20 years because of the action of microbes – yet elsewhere, bacteria can help protect shipwrecks from decay","IsSyndicated":true,"Latitude":"","Location":null,"Longitude":"","Option":[],"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Programme":null,"RelatedStory":[],"RelatedTag":[],"StoryType":"image","SummaryLong":"Some reports suggest the Titanic might disappear within 20 years because of the action of microbes – yet elsewhere, bacteria can help protect shipwrecks from decay","SummaryShort":"It takes a special kind of species to eat away a giant steel ship","SuperSection":null,"Tag":[]},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2017-03-10T09:52:37.411339Z","Entity":"story","Guid":"2c4b9453-d597-4cac-bc72-0a7e8a41d750","Id":"wwearth/story/20170310-the-wreck-of-the-titanic-is-being-eaten-and-may-soon-vanish","ModifiedDateTime":"2017-03-15T10:24:44.312465Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"20170310-the-wreck-of-the-titanic-is-being-eaten-and-may-soon-vanish"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:story:wwearth/story/20170310-the-wreck-of-the-titanic-is-being-eaten-and-may-soon-vanish","_id":"5a429e52b22216e32f366060"},{"Content":{"AssetCustom":"","AssetIbroadcast":null,"AssetImage":[],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":[],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":[],"BodyHtml":"<p>A decade ago, Fabrice Schnöller was an engineer working on systems for tracking sharks. Then, in 2007, he went on a sailing trip to the island of Mauritius, where something happened that would change the course of his life.</p><p>As his boat approached the coast, giant towers of steam began exploding out of the water. One by one the columns closed in, until they surrounded the whole boat. Curious as to the source of this strange ocean phenomenon, Schnöller grabbed his snorkling equipment and a camera, and jumped in.</p><p>Diving down beneath the ship, Schnöller's ears were bombarded by what sounded like underwater explosions, growing louder the deeper he went. At first he feared the boat had suffered a mechanical failure. But as he circled around, he began to sense that he was not alone.</p><p>Glancing downwards, Schnöller froze. Out of the darkness, a series of giant dark monolithic shapes were heading directly towards him. It was a pod of sperm whales accelerating towards the surface.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kd7h6\"}}</p><p>As they approached, the sounds grew louder and louder until they penetrated his flesh like an X-ray. Schnöller felt the warm vibrations passing through his skeleton from every angle.</p><blockquote><p> With sperm whales you really feel a connection, which is totally different to other animals </p></blockquote><p>The whales surrounded him, staring with large, unblinking eyes. At more than 60 feet in length and weighing approximately 125,000 pounds, they dwarfed him. But rather than swallowing the helpless Schnöller in one giant gulp, the whales appeared to be deeply intrigued.</p><p>After scanning him, the rhythm structure of their sounds began to change. Schnöller later realised that these were the patterns that we believe sperm whales use to communicate and send information. The whales appeared to be speaking to him.</p><p>They stayed for two hours, circling, staring and showering him with bursts of sound, before vanishing once more into the deep. Schnöller was entranced.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kdnt6\"}}</p><p>\"In France we say that you see the soul of a person through their eyes,\" he says. \"With sperm whales you really feel a connection, which is totally different to other animals. When you dive with a big fish like a shark there's nothing at all, but when a sperm whale looks directly at you, you can feel he's thinking and analysing you, and you don't know who's weighing up who.\"</p><blockquote><p> Sperm whales are the loudest animals on the planet </p></blockquote><p>The whales were curious about Schnöller. \"I could see instantly that all of them were very interested in my camera,\" he says. \"One of them would take it in its mouth, and I'd have to go bring it back. That kind of extreme curiosity is something you would typically expect from only humans. But what I wanted to find out was whether their behaviour was simply curiosity, or was there something more?\"</p><p>Were the whales really trying to communicate with Schnöller? To find out, in 2009 he began a new project called <a href=\"http://www.darewin.org/\">DareWin</a> to understand sperm whale communication at a deeper level than ever before.</p><p>There are only 20 or so scientists in the whole world studying sperm whales, which are notoriously shy and elusive, so progress is slow. Schnöller aims to speed things up by collecting the largest-ever database of sperm whale vocalisations and behavioural videos.</p><p>His ultimate goal is to first decode the information contained within whale clicks, and then construct a new click that he could send to the whales. But this would require going where none of his peers had gone before: freediving and mingling with the whales.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kd6k9\"}}</p><p>Sperm whale vocalisations have long fascinated scientists for one reason in particular. They are almost inconceivably loud.</p><blockquote><p> They dive up to 10,000ft under the ocean surface, hunting for fish and giant squid </p></blockquote><p>While normal human speech takes place between 60 and 65 decibels (dB), sperm whale clicks, described as such because we hear them as \"tak-tak-tak\", can reach as high as 235dB. In contrast, a loud rock concert is around 115dB and the sound of a jet engine is roughly 140dB. Quite simply, sperm whales are the loudest animals on the planet.</p><p>Such is the power of their clicks that whales can comfortably transmit information to others from hundreds of miles away, and even across vast oceans. A sound of 180dB is enough to cause drastic cell death in your ears, but the most powerful sperm whale clicks will not merely deafen you: they can vibrate the fragile human body to pieces.</p><p>The whales have evolved these astonishingly powerful vocalisations to cope with their extraordinary lifestyle.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kd6kf\"}}</p><p>Sperm whales range across the open ocean, but they typically gather at deep canyons, to socialise, mate and huntfood sources no other predator can reach. They dive up to 10,000ft under the ocean surface, hunting for fish and giant squid.</p><blockquote><p> Some scientists believe the whales also use them to pass information between each other </p></blockquote><p>A sperm whale detects its prey by sending echolocation clicks from the front of its nose and listening for the echo, which reverberates in a fatty sac beneath its mouth. This enables it to pinpoint a single squid from thousands of feet away.</p><p>\"Sperm whales spend most of their lives in the darkness because they hunt in a part of the ocean where light does not reach,\" says Fred Buyle, an underwater photographer and cameraman with DareWin. \"They use these clicks as a visual tool to see and analyse what's around them. They perceive the world through sound.\"</p><p>But as well as using clicks as a form of sonar, some scientists believe the whales also use them to pass information between each other.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kd7n5\"}}</p><p>Sperm whales sometimes produce special clicks called \"coda clicks\". When slowed down and viewed on a computer, these clicks reveal almost infinitely detailed layers. Each click contains a series of smaller clicks interlaced within, and a series of even smaller clicks within those, and so on.</p><p>The time intervals within these clicks are of the order of milliseconds, yet sperm whales can replicate them exactly. They can also make precise revisions, reorganising the pattern of the clicks within a click and then sending it back to a neighbour, all within a fraction of a second.</p><blockquote><p> We want to try and access the information within these clicks and try to show that these animals have a complex language </p></blockquote><p>This is a level of control that humans lack. Our voices vary constantly in volume and frequency, so that the same word spoken twice will never be exactly the same.</p><p>\"Human speech is built on units of sound called phonemes,\" Schnöller says. \"When we speak, we put it in a timescale, like 'I', 'talk', 'to', 'you.' It's analogue. Sperm whale communication is digital. They transmit a thin sound with all the information contained inside it and then they can modulate it, a bit like the way the internet works.\"</p><p>The challenge is to decode the clicks. \"We want to try and access the information within these clicks and try to show that these animals have a complex language,\" Schnöller says.</p><p>One reason Schnöller and others are convinced that sperm whales possess a complex language is that they have such advanced brains.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kdnj9\"}}</p><p>Sperm whales have the largest brain of any living animal. At 8,000 cubic centimetres, it is over five times the volume of ours, a comparably minute 1,300 cubic centimetres.</p><blockquote><p> They gather in the first 50 feet below the surface and that's where we try to study them </p></blockquote><p>What's more, their neurological processes are far more cemented in evolutionary history. The human brain has changed markedly over the past million years, and we have only had the big brains we do now for about 200,000 years. In contrast, the current size of the sperm whale brain has changed little from that of its cetacean ancestors, which evolved some 55 million years ago.</p><p>In addition, the sperm whale cortex contains neurons called spindle cells. These long, straggly structures are found in humans and only a small handful of other species. They are thought to allow for rapid communication between distant brain regions, as well as allowing us to feel love, process emotions, interact socially and feel empathy for others.</p><p>All this suggests that sperm whales are pretty adept thinkers. However, even getting data on their behaviour is long, painstaking and sometimes dangerous work.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kd7vj\"}}</p><p>For starters, finding sperm whales is not easy. They spend much of their time prowling thousands of feet below the ocean surface in search of food. They are also easily spooked and avoid submarines, underwater robots and humans in scuba gear.</p><blockquote><p> DareWin team members can hold their breath for seven minutes at a time </p></blockquote><p>But they do come to the surface to breathe and socialise.</p><p>\"They gather in the first 50 feet below the surface and that's where we try to study them, because it's where they seem to 'talk' with each other,\" Buyle says. \"We try to film and record the sounds they make, so we can determine which whales in the group are sending clicks specifically aimed at each other.\"</p><p>This is a tricky business. \"You have to try and integrate with a large group of whales,\" says Buyle. \"That's why we free-dive, because it's not invasive or threatening at all. It's silent and it allows us to move better in the water and get the animals curious.\"</p><p>{\"video\":{ \"pid\": \"p04k86jv\",\"encoding\": \"ib2\" }}</p><p>Being experienced free-divers, and in Buyle's case a former competitor, DareWin team members can hold their breath for seven minutes at a time. They spend nine hours or more underwater each day, recording the animals in three-dimensional video and high-definition audio.</p><blockquote><p> They take great care to let you into the middle of their group while not bumping into you or causing you harm </p></blockquote><p>But how much access they are able to get is largely in the whales' hands.</p><p>\"Trying to get close to a wild animal doesn't really work, because they just swim away from you,\" Buyle says. \"We always let the whales discover us and decide if they want the encounter, because then we know they want to interact. Sometimes our boat will drop us 400m from the whales and we just wait there, sometimes for an hour, in the middle of nowhere.\"</p><p>Often the whales are not interested. \"Sometimes they just pass by 15m away, and they see you, but they just keep on swimming,\" Buyle laughs. \"It's exactly the same as with us, there's times of the day when you're at home and you don't want to be bothered. When they're in feeding mode, they will just dive, come up and dive again for hours at a time. They have a job to do and they're totally focused on that.\"</p><p>Even when the whales do play ball, being in the midst of a pod of animals 500 times your weight and 10 times your size comes with certain dangers.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kdjm0\"}}</p><p>Happily, being eaten does not seem to be one of the risks.</p><blockquote><p> The energy from the smallest clicks is so strong that you can really feel it tingling through your body </p></blockquote><p>\"The funny thing about them is that they eat one and a half tons of fish and squid every day, and their teeth are seven inches long, but as soon as you get in the water with them, you're immediately sure that they're absolutely not interested in us as a potential meal,\" says Buyle. \"Instead they are very conscious of their space in the water. They seem to be able to understand that we are comparatively useless in their environment, and they take great care to let you into the middle of their group while not bumping into you or causing you harm.\"</p><p>\"The adults are incredibly conscious of their own size, so they can sometimes come centimetres from you and you don't even feel the water moving,\" Schnöller says. \"But the really young whales don't really know their space, so you have to be careful.\"</p><p>A playful tail flick from a juvenile can be instantly fatal, and anyone swimming side-by-side with them runs the risk of being accidentally smothered.</p><p>What's more, their loud calls are an issue.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kdmns\"}}</p><p>\"The energy from the smallest clicks is so strong that you can really feel it tingling through your body,\" says Schnöller.</p><p>In one incident in 2011, a calf began jostling Schnöller with its nose. He held up his hand to gently move the whale away, and felt a sudden hot pain through his arm. Such was the power of the clicks coming from the calf that his hand was paralysed for several hours.</p><blockquote><p> If you do something playful, then they stay. They love it </p></blockquote><p>But some moments are worth such risks.</p><p>\"The most incredible experience was when I got in the water and there was a female who had just given birth minutes beforehand,\" Buyle says. \"There was a big pod of more than 30 whales and given that when an animal gives birth, it's at its most fragile, I was backing away. But instead, they integrated me in the midst of their group and the mother pushed the little new-born sperm whale towards me. It seemed like they could understand what I was about and that I wasn't a threat.\"</p><p>\"So far the best connection we can establish with them is through play,\" Schnöller says. \"They don't come just to stare at you. If you do nothing, then they leave after five minutes. But if you do something playful, then they stay. They love it.\"</p><p>Schnöller is hopeful that we might one day understand some of the meaning behind sperm whale clicks. However, while we know the basic structure of human language – for instance, that words can be assembled into sentences – we have no idea how the sperm whale clicks are built up.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kd6k5\"}}</p><p>The solution is to use advanced computer algorithms to examine thousands of clicks, breaking them down and analysing their frequency structure and organisation, and probe for common trends.</p><blockquote><p> At this point, Glotin can look at a click and tell whether the whale is male or female </p></blockquote><p>At the University of Toulon on France's Mediterranean coast, <a href=\"https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=DqieizcAAAAJ&hl=en\">Hervé Glotin</a> is doing just that.</p><p>Glotin, the head of an international bioacoustic research consortium called <a href=\"http://sabiod.univ-tln.fr/\">SABIOD</a>, is combing through data collected from sperm whales around the world. He is using machine learning – the same techniques that banks use to predict stock market trends – to see whether each whale has a unique \"signature\" in their clicks that identifies them, in the same way that every human has a unique voice.</p><p>\"From what we've seen, we think that each sperm whale has a pitch to their clicks, similar to the timbre of a human voice,\" Glotin says. \"In humans, this timbre is determined [by] our vocal tract, head size and head shape. We can't yet say definitively, but the texture and fine spectral content of the clicks from a particular whale are probably dependent on the head structure and tissue of that animal.\"</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kdnpj\"}}</p><p>At this point, Glotin can look at a click and tell whether the whale is male or female, <a href=\"http://glotin.lsis.univ-tln.fr/IEEE_OCOSS2013_IPI_BIVIP.pdf\">and get an idea of the size of the animal</a>.</p><p>What's more, <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.150372\">in a study published in January 2016</a>, scientists studying clicks made by different pods of sperm whales detected signs of different dialects or even accents. \"There is a rhythm structure to the clicks,\" Glotin says. \"Each burst of clicks comes with a particular rhythm, and that rhythm is unique to the pod of whales.\"</p><p>This is all promising. Nevertheless, our understanding of sperm whale clicks remains primitive, largely because the way they perceive and sense the world is completely different.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kd7j5\"}}</p><p>\"Humans have a very poor idea of high-frequency and high-intensity acoustics, because we don't live in these kinds of worlds,\" Glotin says. \"Our acoustic range is 100Hz-20kHz, with a decibel range of 40dB. And that's it. Sperm whales can process acoustic information from 5kHz-50kHz with a decibel range of 200dB. Their world is based around sound.\"</p><blockquote><p> Sperm whales often communicate with whales so far away that they will never come into physical contact </p></blockquote><p>The whales may even use sound to \"touch\" each other. \"We believe that, as a pod, they caress and touch each other at short distances using acoustics,\" says Glotin. \"They emit very strong and heavy sounds, which vibrate inside the others like a deep caress, and that is how they display affection.\"</p><p>\"Their body language is also extremely important,\" argues Schnöller. Intriguingly, when the whales send coda clicks they are normally facing each other. \"We're studying their posture and looking at whether there are situations where there may be a dialogue rather than just a simple question, and if so, what sounds do they use?\"</p><p>Such behaviour occurs at short distances, but because sound travels so well underwater, a sperm whale's immediate world stretches over several kilometres. We humans normally only talk to people that we can see – at least, until the invention of the telephone – but sperm whales often communicate with whales so far away that they will never come into physical contact.</p><p>This can all seem quite alien. If sperm whale communication is so profoundly unlike ours, could we ever get a handle on it?</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p04kdn6f\"}}</p><p>\"We don't know if they ask the same questions, or if they can have the same paradigms that we have,\" Glotin says.</p><p>Still, there are some things that it seems the whales simply have to be discussing. \"There is… basic information which they must share with each other, such as the structure of their society, where the food is, what type of food it is, and whether there is any danger to their young,\" says Glotin.</p><blockquote><p> We believe that, as a pod, they caress and touch each other at short distances using acoustics </p></blockquote><p>Although some of this might be encoded in body language, it at least gives us a place to start.</p><p>\"From the level of detail within the click, we can try to ascertain whether the whale is looking for a squid with precision, or whether it has a question in mind, such as the size or quality of the squid,\" says Glotin. \"I am sure that within the clicks we will eventually find cues as to whether the whales are hunting or socialising, by looking for the level of stress in the click structure.\"</p><p>Still, deciphering what the clicks represent to other sperm whales – let alone making comprehensible clicks of our own – remains a distant dream.</p><p>\"Acoustics for them is their eyes,\" Glotin says. \"By playing with frequencies, decibel levels and rhythms, they are drawing complex scenes to their neighbours. And we are not ready, I think, to imagine what can be drawn by those sounds.\"</p><p><em>Join over six million BBC Earth fans by liking us on <a href=\"https://www.facebook.com/bbcearth\" target=\"_blank\">Facebook</a>, or follow us on <a href=\"https://twitter.com/bbcearth\" target=\"_blank\">Twitter</a> and <a href=\"https://instagram.com/bbcearth/\" target=\"_blank\">Instagram</a>.</em></p><p><em>If you liked this story, <a href=\"http://pages.emails.bbc.com/subscribe/?ocid=ear.bbc.email.we.email-signup\" target=\"_blank\">sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter</a> called \"If You Only Read 6 Things This Week\". A handpicked selection of stories from BBC Future, Earth, Culture, Capital, Travel and Autos, delivered to your inbox every Friday.</em></p>","BusinessUnit":"worldwide","CalloutBody":"","CalloutPosition":"","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"","Campaign":null,"Collection":[],"DisableAdverts":false,"DisplayDate":"2016-12-07T07:00:00Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"The people who dive with whales that could eat them alive","HeadlineShort":"Diving with Earth's biggest predator","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"Sperm whales are the biggest living things with teeth, and they seem to \"talk\" to each other. To decipher their messages, scientists are free-diving with them","IsSyndicated":true,"Latitude":"","Location":null,"Longitude":"","Option":null,"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Programme":null,"RelatedStory":[],"RelatedTag":[],"StoryType":"image","SummaryLong":"Sperm whales are the biggest living things with teeth, and they seem to \"talk\" to each other. 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Hoffmann/Getty)","SynopsisMedium":"Bioluminescence, glow in the dark sea","SynopsisShort":"Bioluminescence, glow in the dark sea","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/21/4w/p0214w03.jpg","Title":"Sailing through stars","CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p0214w03","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p0214w03","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p0214w03","_id":"5a437a4eb22216e32f36d1b2"}],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":null,"AssetSelect":"gallery","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":[{"Content":{"AssetImage":null,"Description":"","Email":[],"Links":null,"Name":"Lindsey Galloway","PrimaryVertical":"wwtravel"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2015-02-10T17:49:03Z","Entity":"author","Guid":"ce84c35d-c02e-4e0b-b909-6b169f3f035b","Id":"wwtravel/author/lindsey-galloway","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-02-10T17:49:03Z","Project":"wwtravel","Slug":"lindsey-galloway"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:author:wwtravel/author/lindsey-galloway","_id":"5a3ce0b3b22216e32f316b8c"}],"BodyHtml":"<p>As night falls on certain beaches around\nthe world, the waves glow with an eerie blue light: tiny, neon dots that make\nit look as though stars are washing up on shore.</p><p>The surreal scene arises not from magic,\nbut from plankton that have evolved to glow in order to startle or distract fish\nand other potential predators. Some scientists call it the “burglar alarm effect”:\nby lighting up, the plankton draw even larger predators that, in turn, eat the\nanimal threatening them. The phosphorescence only occurs when the microorganisms,\nwhich exist worldwide, are agitated – such as when the water crashes onto the shore,\nsomeone steps on the wet sand or a paddle hits the waves. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>The phenomenon’s effects can vary depending\non time of year and weather, so sightings cannot always be predicted. Even so,\nhere are three spots where you’re most likely to see the sea shine with its own\nlight.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Maldives</strong><a href=\"http://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic-g293953-i7445-k7145588-Bioluminescent_Phytoplankton_which_Islands_has_them-Maldives.html\"><br />Visitors\nto the Indian Ocean archipelago say</a> they have had the most luck seeing the\nblue glow from about July to February, especially during a new moon since the\ndarkness of the sky helps intensify the light. The bioluminescence can occur\nthroughout the country’s 26 atolls, but some of the most spectacular\nphotographs have been captured on the grouping’s eastern islands, including <a href=\"https://www.flickr.com/photos/78546112@N00/11269034823/in/photostream/\">Mudhdhoo</a>,\n<a href=\"http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/03/pictures/120319-glowing-waves-ocean-blue-bioluminescent-plankton-science/\">Vaadhoo</a>\nand <a href=\"http://www.visitmaldives.com/en/news_posts/464\">Rangali</a>. \n\n</p>\n\n<p><strong>Puerto\nRico</strong><br />Mosquito Bay on the island of Vieques has\nthe nickname of Bioluminescent Bay (often called Bio Bay) for the bright\nplankton that illuminates the water. \nUnexpectedly, <a href=\"http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/05/us/puerto-rico-debates-who-put-out-the-lights-in-a-bay.html?_r=0\">the\nbay went dark</a> in January 2014. Some scientists theorise that a wind shift\npushed many of the microorganisms out of the bay, but the various factors that\ncontribute to the bioluminescence make it difficult to say for sure. \n\n</p>\n\n<p>Thankfully, the bay brightened again in\nJune, although at a lower intensity. Though no one knows if the bay will return\nto full strength, tour operators are still running kayak tours Fridays through\nSundays, as scientists work to study the bay the rest of the week in hopes of\npreserving the magical glow. </p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>San\nDiego</strong><br />There is bizarre bioluminescence in this\nSouthern Californian city, too, caused when millions of phytoplankton form a\ngroup of algae so big they discolour the nearby water. Surfers see a “red tide”\nevery few years, when these algal blooms give the sea a reddish tint by day and\na bright blue phosphorescent glow by night. When the right combination of water\ntemperature, wind, darkness of the sky and other factors come together, surfers\nand swimmers can glide through the water <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Py-J1ZazHDM\">with a glow illuminating\ntheir way</a>. Though some algal bloom can be harmful, the species common to San Diego, <em>Lingulodinium\npolyedrum, </em>is not considered to be toxic. </p>","BusinessUnit":"worldwide","Campaign":null,"Collection":[{"Content":{"AssetImage":[],"CollectionOverrides":null,"CollectionType":"column","Description":"Stories about funky festivals, eccentric food and odd destinations.","Name":"Worldwide Weird","PrimaryVertical":"wwtravel","Title":"Worldwide Weird","CreationDateTime":"2015-02-11T14:51:54.34867Z","Entity":"collection","Guid":"78f115d8-b53e-4aba-8aef-66d1568d73d8","Id":"wwtravel/column/worldwide-weird","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-02-12T18:07:35.801447Z","Project":"wwtravel","Slug":"column/worldwide-weird"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2015-02-11T14:51:54.34867Z","Entity":"collection","Guid":"78f115d8-b53e-4aba-8aef-66d1568d73d8","Id":"wwtravel/column/worldwide-weird","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-02-12T18:07:35.801447Z","Project":"wwtravel","Slug":"column/worldwide-weird"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:collection:wwtravel/column/worldwide-weird","_id":"5a3ce0bab22216e32f3173b0"}],"DisableAdverts":false,"DisplayDate":"2014-07-05T00:00:00Z","HeadlineLong":"Seas that glow like stars","HeadlineShort":"Beautiful bioluminescent beaches","Intro":"A bizarre natural phenomenon lights up the water off these three beaches, making the sea shine with a surreal blue light.","IsSyndicated":false,"Location":null,"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwtravel","RelatedStory":null,"RelatedTag":null,"StoryType":"image","SummaryLong":"A bizarre natural phenomenon lights up the water off these three beaches, making the sea shine with a surreal blue light.","SummaryShort":"A bizarre natural phenomenon turns waters neon","Tag":[{"Content":{"AssetImage":[],"Description":"","LinkUrl":"","Name":"Beaches","CreationDateTime":"2010-08-31T13:55:08Z","Entity":"tag","Guid":"461c5316-0d63-4789-9823-da78f4fd7f70","Id":"tag/beaches","ModifiedDateTime":"2017-05-03T15:28:22.27704Z","Project":"","Slug":"beaches"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2010-08-31T13:55:08Z","Entity":"tag","Guid":"461c5316-0d63-4789-9823-da78f4fd7f70","Id":"tag/beaches","ModifiedDateTime":"2017-05-03T15:28:22.27704Z","Project":"","Slug":"beaches"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:tag:tag/beaches","_id":"5a3ce47db22216e32f334e37"},{"Content":{"AssetImage":[],"Description":"","LinkUrl":"","Name":"Nature & Outdoors","CreationDateTime":"2010-08-31T13:55:09Z","Entity":"tag","Guid":"87d24744-7f21-4467-b7db-d03e1ac9c1ca","Id":"tag/nature-outdoors","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-02-11T21:47:35.221592Z","Project":"","Slug":"nature-outdoors"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2010-08-31T13:55:09Z","Entity":"tag","Guid":"87d24744-7f21-4467-b7db-d03e1ac9c1ca","Id":"tag/nature-outdoors","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-02-11T21:47:35.221592Z","Project":"","Slug":"nature-outdoors"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:tag:tag/nature-outdoors","_id":"5a3ce47fb22216e32f334fd8"}],"CreationDateTime":"2014-07-04T11:41:14Z","Entity":"story","Guid":"dc47578b-449a-4bbf-ab8f-1a838b5a381b","Id":"wwtravel/story/20140619-seas-that-glow-like-stars","ModifiedDateTime":"2014-07-04T11:41:14Z","Project":"wwtravel","Slug":"20140619-seas-that-glow-like-stars"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2014-07-04T11:41:14Z","Entity":"story","Guid":"dc47578b-449a-4bbf-ab8f-1a838b5a381b","Id":"wwtravel/story/20140619-seas-that-glow-like-stars","ModifiedDateTime":"2014-07-04T11:41:14Z","Project":"wwtravel","Slug":"20140619-seas-that-glow-like-stars"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:story:wwtravel/story/20140619-seas-that-glow-like-stars","_id":"5a412378b22216e32f359b61"},{"Content":{"AssetCustom":"","AssetIbroadcast":null,"AssetImage":[{"Content":{"Copyright":"","FileSizeBytes":3855726,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":3038,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2f/38/p02f38fw.jpg","SourceWidth":5400,"SynopsisLong":"A Humboldt squid (Dosidicus gigas) (Credit: WaterFrame / Alamy)","SynopsisMedium":"A Humboldt squid (Dosidicus gigas) (Credit: WaterFrame / Alamy)","SynopsisShort":"A Humboldt squid (Dosidicus gigas) (Credit: WaterFrame / Alamy)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2f/38/p02f38fw.jpg","Title":"Dosidicus_gigas WaterFrame Alamy crop2.jpg","CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02f38fw","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02f38fw","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02f38fw","_id":"5a43b075b22216e32f36eeec"}],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":[{"Content":{"Copyright":"T. 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Kubodera / National Museum of Nature and Science)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2f/7q/p02f7qgc.jpg","Title":"2006_giant_squid_surface Kubodera National_Museum_Nature_Science crop.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02f7qgc","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02f7qgc","_id":"5a426879b22216e32f364395"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"Inger Winkelmann","FileSizeBytes":83722,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":549,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2d/zf/p02dzf2j.jpg","SourceWidth":976,"SynopsisLong":"Specimens of the first giant squid remains (Credit: Inger Winkelmann )","SynopsisMedium":"Specimens of the first giant squid remains (Credit: Inger Winkelmann )","SynopsisShort":"Specimens of the first giant squid remains (Credit: Inger Winkelmann )","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2d/zf/p02dzf2j.jpg","Title":"Architeuthis in a jar 1857"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02dzf2j","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02dzf2j","_id":"5a4400e6b22216e32f371846"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"EOL Learning and Education Group, CC by 2.0","FileSizeBytes":3236767,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":2116,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2d/zr/p02dzrcd.jpg","SourceWidth":3762,"SynopsisLong":"A preserved male giant squid (Credit: EOL Learning and Education Group, CC by 2.0)","SynopsisMedium":"A preserved male giant squid (Credit: EOL Learning and Education Group, CC by 2.0)","SynopsisShort":"A preserved male giant squid (Credit: EOL Learning and Education Group, CC by 2.0)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2d/zr/p02dzrcd.jpg","Title":"preserved_giant_squid EOL_Learning_and_Education_Group crop.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02dzrcd","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02dzrcd","_id":"5a4281ebb22216e32f3650ee"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"Museum of New Zealand Te Para Tongarewa","FileSizeBytes":3880119,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":3571,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2f/1g/p02f1g6n.jpg","SourceWidth":6348,"SynopsisLong":"A preserved colossal squid (Credit: Museum of New Zealand Te Para Tongarewa)","SynopsisMedium":"A preserved colossal squid (Credit: Museum of New Zealand Te Para Tongarewa)","SynopsisShort":"A preserved colossal squid (Credit: Museum of New Zealand Te Para Tongarewa)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2f/1g/p02f1g6n.jpg","Title":"Colossal_squid Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa crop.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02f1g6n","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02f1g6n","_id":"5a422ed9b22216e32f3625ff"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"","FileSizeBytes":3367803,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":2098,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2f/06/p02f0699.jpg","SourceWidth":3731,"SynopsisLong":"A Humboldt squid (Dosidicus gigas) (Credit: Steve Bloom Images / Alamy)","SynopsisMedium":"A Humboldt squid (Dosidicus gigas) (Credit: Steve Bloom Images / Alamy)","SynopsisShort":"A Humboldt squid (Dosidicus gigas) (Credit: Steve Bloom Images / Alamy)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2f/06/p02f0699.jpg","Title":"Humboldt_squid_Dosidicus_gigas Steve_Bloom_Images Alamy crop.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02f0699","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02f0699","_id":"5a414789b22216e32f35adc9"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"T. Kubodera / Royal Society","FileSizeBytes":143948,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":360,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2f/7r/p02f7r0w.jpg","SourceWidth":640,"SynopsisLong":"One of the first photos of a live giant squid (Credit: T. Kubodera / Royal Society)","SynopsisMedium":"One of the first photos of a live giant squid (Credit: T. Kubodera / Royal Society)","SynopsisShort":"One of the first photos of a live giant squid (Credit: T. Kubodera / Royal Society)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2f/7r/p02f7r0w.jpg","Title":"2005_giant_squid Kubodera National_Museum_Nature_Science crop.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02f7r0w","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02f7r0w","_id":"5a414787b22216e32f35adc3"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"","FileSizeBytes":775921,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":871,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2d/zp/p02dzpw4.jpg","SourceWidth":1548,"SynopsisLong":"Dozens of giant squid (not pictured) (Credit: Rudolf Getel, CC by 2.0)","SynopsisMedium":"Dozens of giant squid (not pictured) (Credit: Rudolf Getel, CC by 2.0)","SynopsisShort":"Dozens of giant squid (not pictured) (Credit: Rudolf Getel, CC by 2.0)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2d/zp/p02dzpw4.jpg","Title":"open_ocean Rudolf_Getel_CCby20 crop.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02dzpw4","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02dzpw4","_id":"5a41478bb22216e32f35adcf"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"Mark McMenamin","FileSizeBytes":340510,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":450,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2d/zd/p02dzdpj.jpg","SourceWidth":800,"SynopsisLong":"Fossilised vertebrae of an ichthyosaur - killed by a huge squid? (Credit: Mark McMenamin)","SynopsisMedium":"Fossilised vertebrae of an ichthyosaur - killed by a huge squid? (Credit: Mark McMenamin)","SynopsisShort":"Fossilised vertebrae of an ichthyosaur - killed by a huge squid? (Credit: Mark McMenamin)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2d/zd/p02dzdpj.jpg","Title":"Ichthyosaur_vertebrae Mark_McMenamin crop.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02dzdpj","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02dzdpj","_id":"5a414789b22216e32f35adca"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"Mark McMenamin","FileSizeBytes":182569,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":338,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2d/zd/p02dzdy9.jpg","SourceWidth":600,"SynopsisLong":"Is this a fossilised fragment of a truly huge squid beak? (Credit: Mark McMenamin)","SynopsisMedium":"Is this a fossilised fragment of a truly huge squid beak? (Credit: Mark McMenamin)","SynopsisShort":"Is this a fossilised fragment of a truly huge squid beak? (Credit: Mark McMenamin)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2d/zd/p02dzdy9.jpg","Title":"Fossil_squid_beak Mark_McMenamin crop.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02dzdy9","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02dzdy9","_id":"5a41478ab22216e32f35adcd"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"World History Archive / Alamy","FileSizeBytes":3896611,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":3015,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2d/zm/p02dzmq4.jpg","SourceWidth":5359,"SynopsisLong":"An engraving of the kraken, from 1870 (Credit: World History Archive / Alamy)","SynopsisMedium":"An engraving of the kraken, from 1870 (Credit: World History Archive / Alamy)","SynopsisShort":"An engraving of the kraken, from 1870 (Credit: World History Archive / Alamy)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2d/zm/p02dzmq4.jpg","Title":"kraken_engraving World_History_Archive Alamy crop.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02dzmq4","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02dzmq4","_id":"5a4287c4b22216e32f365433"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"Johanne Jacobsen Halken","FileSizeBytes":3609764,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":2753,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2d/zd/p02dzd88.jpg","SourceWidth":4894,"SynopsisLong":"The giant squid beak described by Japetus Steenstrup (Credit: Johanne Jacobsen Halken)","SynopsisMedium":"The giant squid beak described by Japetus Steenstrup (Credit: Johanne Jacobsen Halken)","SynopsisShort":"The giant squid beak described by Japetus Steenstrup (Credit: Johanne Jacobsen Halken)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2d/zd/p02dzd88.jpg","Title":"Architeuthis_dux_original_beak Johanne_Jacobsen_Halken crop.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02dzd88","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02dzd88","_id":"5a414787b22216e32f35adc4"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"Biodiversity Heritage Library / CC 2.0","FileSizeBytes":315726,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":1024,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2d/zk/p02dzkrl.jpg","SourceWidth":1928,"SynopsisLong":"New species were frequently 'discovered' (Credit: Biodiversity Heritage Library / CC 2.0)","SynopsisMedium":"New species were frequently 'discovered' (Credit: Biodiversity Heritage Library / CC 2.0)","SynopsisShort":"New species were frequently 'discovered' (Credit: Biodiversity Heritage Library / CC 2.0)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2d/zk/p02dzkrl.jpg","Title":"Suid - Biodiversity Heritage Library .jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02dzkrl","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02dzkrl","_id":"5a4387dcb22216e32f36d8fc"},{"Content":{"Copyright":"NTNU // CC 2.0","FileSizeBytes":67406,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":549,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/2d/zh/p02dzh3z.jpg","SourceWidth":976,"SynopsisLong":"The squid have eight arms covered with sharp suction cups (Credit: NTNU // CC 2.0)","SynopsisMedium":"The squid have eight arms covered with sharp suction cups (Credit: NTNU // CC 2.0)","SynopsisShort":"The squid have eight arms covered with sharp suction cups (Credit: NTNU // CC 2.0)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/2d/zh/p02dzh3z.jpg","Title":"NTNU-Vitenskapsmuseet.jpg"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p02dzh3z","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p02dzh3z","_id":"5a423ec4b22216e32f362e11"}],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":[{"Content":{"AssetImage":[],"Description":"","Email":[],"Links":null,"Name":"Melissa Hogenboom","PrimaryVertical":"wwearth"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2014-11-20T10:38:02Z","Entity":"author","Guid":"41db68c7-5a21-4f5c-bb0e-8540c2adcc3b","Id":"wwearth/author/melissa-hogenboom","ModifiedDateTime":"2016-04-19T16:13:25.465774Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"melissa-hogenboom"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:author:wwearth/author/melissa-hogenboom","_id":"5a3ce0b3b22216e32f316aa6"}],"BodyHtml":"<p>For centuries, fishermen from Norway and Greenland have told tales of a terrifying sea monster: the kraken. Supposedly, this vast creature has giant tentacles that can pluck you from your boat and drag you to the depths of the ocean. You can't see it coming, because it lurks deep beneath you in the dark water. But if you suddenly find yourself catching a great many fish, you should flee: the kraken might be beneath you, scaring the fish towards the surface.</p><p>In 1857, the kraken began to move from myth to reality, thanks to the Danish naturalist Japetus Steenstrup. He examined a large squid beak, about 8 cm (3 in) across, that had washed up on Denmark's shores several years earlier. Originally he could only guess at the overall size of the animal, but soon he was sent parts of another specimen from the Bahamas. When Steenstrup finally published his findings, he concluded that the kraken was real, and it was a species of giant squid. He named it <a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/488790/overview\" target=\"_blank\"><em>Architeuthis dux</em></a>, meaning \"ruling squid\" in Latin.</p><p>Only after Steenstrup had described the creature could scientists begin to unravel whether there was any truth to the old myths. Was this huge squid really as dangerous as the legends had led people to believe? Where did it come from, and what was it up to in the dark depths of the sea?</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dzmq4\"}}</p><p>The kraken has held a grip on people's imaginations for hundreds of years. The Norwegian writer Erik Pontoppidan described one in detail in his 1755 book <a href=\"http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Natural_History_of_Norway.html?id=3OglUqRf_soC\" target=\"_blank\"><em>The Natural History of Norway</em></a>. According to fishermen, Pontoppidan wrote, it was the size of a \"number of small islands\", and its back appeared to be \"about an English mile and a half\".</p><blockquote><p> Sail too close and the Scylla would try to eat you </p></blockquote><p>Its grasping tentacles were only part of the problem. \"After this monster has been on the surface of the water a short time, it begins slowly to sink again, and then the danger is as great as before; because the motion of his sinking causes such a swell in the sea, and such an eddy or whirlpool, that it draws everything down with it.\"</p><p>Different cultures had different names for similar-sounding monsters. Greek mythology describes the Scylla, a six-headed sea goddess who ruled the rocks on one side of a narrow strait. Sail too close and she would try to eat you. In Homer's <a href=\"http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1727\" target=\"_blank\"><em>The Odyssey</em></a>, Odysseus was forced to sail close to Scylla to avoid an even worse monster. As a result, six of his men were lost to Scylla, who swung them up onto her cliff and \"bolted them down raw\".</p><p>Even science fiction writers have got in on the act. In <a href=\"http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/164\" target=\"_blank\"><em>Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea</em></a>, Jules Verne describes a giant squid that is distinctly kraken-like. It \"could entangle a ship of five thousand tons and bury it into the abyss of the ocean.\" So does the real giant squid live up to its legendary counterparts?</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dzd88\"}}</p><p>Since Steenstrup's initial discovery, about 21 more species of giant squid have been described. None were from live animals, but rather from parts, or occasionally whole specimens, washed up on shore.</p><blockquote><p> Even now, nobody is even sure how big giant squid can grow </p></blockquote><p>For example, in 1933 <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1096-3642.1933.tb01614.x\" target=\"_blank\">a new species called <em>A. clarkei</em> was described by Guy Colborn Robson</a>, from a near-intact specimen found on a beach in Yorkshire, England. It was \"referable to none of the species hitherto described\", but was so badly disintegrated that Robson could not even determine its sex. Others have been described after they were found inside the bellies of sperm whales, which evidently ate them.</p><p>Giant squid are thought to grow to a length of 13 or even 15 m, including their tentacles. One estimate suggested they could reach 18m, but that could be a serious overestimate, says <a href=\"http://www.nhm.ac.uk/research-curation/about-science/staff-directory/life-sciences/j-ablett/index.html\" target=\"_blank\">Jon Ablett</a> of the Natural History Museum in London, UK. That's because squid tissue can act like rubber in the midday sun, so when a squid washes up and dries out it can stretch out.</p><p>It's telling that, even now, nobody is even sure how big giant squid can grow. Whole specimens are hardly ever found, due to the squid's elusive nature. They spend much of their time at depths of 400 to 1000m. That may be partly an attempt to stay beyond the reach of hungry sperm whales, but it's a partial success at best. The whales are perfectly capable of diving to such depths, and a giant squid is almost defenceless against them.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dzkrl\"}}</p><p>The squid does have one advantage. Its eyes are the largest of any animal: they are as big as dinner plates, up to 27cm (11in) across. These giant peepers are thought to have evolved especially <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2012.02.031\" target=\"_blank\">to spot the whales at great distances</a>, giving the squid time to take evasive action.</p><p>In turn, giant squid prey upon fish, crustaceans and smaller squid, <a href=\"http://www.rug.nl/research/ocean-ecosystems/publications/artikelen/hovingbasteria702006.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">all of which have been discovered in the stomachs of those analysed</a>. One giant squid even turned out to have the remains of other giant squid in its stomach, <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03014223.2004.9518354\" target=\"_blank\">suggesting they sometimes resort to cannibalism</a> – although it's not clear how often.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dzf2j\"}}</p><p>The squid look like they should have no trouble catching prey. They have two long tentacles that could grab their victims. They also have eight arms, covered with dozens of suction cups lined with horny rings with sharp teeth. If an animal gets snared by enough of these suction cups, it could never escape, says <a href=\"http://invertebrates.si.edu/1roper.html\" target=\"_blank\">Clyde Roper</a>, a retired giant squid hunter at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington.</p><p>This sounds like a terrifying ordeal. But none of it is proof that giant squid are active predators. Some big killers, such as <a href=\"http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20141028-the-mystery-shark-of-the-arctic\" target=\"_blank\">sleeper sharks</a>, move slowly to conserve their energy. They only scavenge for food when it presents itself. In theory, giant squid might do the same.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dzh3z\"}}</p><p>This idea was blown out of the water in 2004. Determined to observe a live giant squid in the wild, Tsunemi Kubodera of the National Science Museum in Tokyo, Japan teamed up with whale expert Kyoichi Mori. Together they used the known locations of sperm whales as guides, and <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2005.3158\" target=\"_blank\">snapped a photo of a live giant squid</a> near the Ogasawara Islands in the north Pacific.</p><blockquote><p> He captured the first video footage of giant squid </p></blockquote><p>Kubodera and Mori lured the giant squid with bait, and discovered that it attacked horizontally by stretching out its tentacles in front of it. Once the squid had caught something, its tentacles coiled \"into an irregular ball in much the same way that pythons rapidly envelop their prey within coils of their body immediately after striking,\" according to their report.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02f7r0w\"}}</p><p>Eight years later, Kubodera went one better. Working with a film crew, he captured the first video footage of giant squid.</p><p>The key to this, according to team member <a href=\"http://www.teamorca.org/cfiles/about_edie.cfm\" target=\"_blank\">Edith Widder</a> of the Ocean Research & Conservation Association in Fort Pierce, Florida, was stealth. She suspected that the electric thrusters that power most submersible cameras were scaring away the squid. Instead, she came up with a contraption called Medusa, a battery-operated camera attached to a lure. Medusa emitted a blue light, designed to mimic the light produced by a crown jellyfish called <a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/23696/overview\" target=\"_blank\"><em>Atolla</em></a>. When this jellyfish comes under attack, it uses its light to lure any bigger creatures lurking nearby to swoop in and attack the attacker.</p><p><strong>Dainty feeding<br /></strong></p><p>The footage from the first eight-hour dive was largely blank, but during the second attempt, the enormous arms of a giant squid suddenly flashed up on the screen. \"We were screaming our heads off,\" says Widder.</p><blockquote><p> The squid only took very small, delicate bites </p></blockquote><p>After a few more tries they saw the squid in full and <a href=\"http://www.discovery.com/tv-shows/curiosity/videos/first-video-of-a-giant-squid/\" target=\"_blank\">watched it wrap its arms around the whole camera platform</a>. It precisely aimed for the place where a predator would have been, confirming that it was indeed an active predator.</p><p>To further entice the squid, Kubodera dropped down a smaller squid as bait. He and two others then spent 400 hours in a cramped submarine, to get more footage and see the creature with their own eyes.</p><p>A giant squid did attack, but the bait \"wasn't shredded the way you would have thought,\" says Widder. The squid fed for 23 minutes, but it only took very small, delicate bites with its parrot-like beak, gradually munching away. Widder thinks that giant squid cannot gobble their prey down quickly, because they might choke.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dzrcd\"}}</p><p>Giant squid are clearly not quite the scary monsters they have been painted as. They only attack their direct prey, and Roper believes they are not naturally aggressive to human beings. As far as we can tell they are more gentle giants, says Roper, who calls them \"magnificent creatures\".</p><blockquote><p> Male giant squid have an external penis up to 1m long </p></blockquote><p>Though they have been known for over 150 years, we still know almost nothing about their daily behavioural or social patterns, eating habits or where they travel on a typical day or year. As far we know they are solitary animals, says Roper, but their social lives remain mysterious.</p><p>We don't even know where or how often they mate. We probably can't extrapolate from smaller squid. Whereas in most cephalopods, the males have a modified arm for storing sperm, male giant squid have an external penis up to 1m long.</p><p>In a bid to uncover their mysterious mating habits, <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/39497\" target=\"_blank\">two Australian researchers analysed several female giant squid in 1997</a>. Their findings suggest that giant squid mating is a violent, scattergun business. They concluded that the male uses his muscular and elongated penis to <a href=\"http://www.bbc.com/earth/bespoke/story/20140908-twisted-world-of-sexual-organs/index.html\" target=\"_blank\">\"inject\" packets of sperm called spermatophores directly into the arms of females</a>, leaving shallow wounds. Later studies suggest that the spermatophores do this partly of their own accord, <a href=\"http://www.biolbull.org/content/212/3/177.short\" target=\"_blank\">using enzymes to break through the female's skin</a>.</p><p>It's unknown how females access this sperm to fertilise their eggs. She might rip her skin open with her beak, or the skin covering it may break down and release the sperm.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dzpw4\"}}</p><p>What is clear is that giant squid are very successful at producing offspring. They seem to live in every ocean, apart from the polar regions, and their population must surely be large if they can satisfy the cravings of so many sperm whales. There are probably millions of them out there, says Widder. She says humans have clearly been exploring the deep ocean in a way that scares them off, or we would have seen more of them.</p><blockquote><p> Giant squid living on opposite sides of the planet can be almost genetically identical </p></blockquote><p>What's more, it emerged last year that all 21 species described since 1857 actually belong to the same species. A study of the DNA sequences from 43 tissue samples taken from around the world showed that <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2013.0273\" target=\"_blank\">what seemed to be separate species were all freely interbreeding</a>.</p><p>This may be because young squid larvae are transported all around the oceans in powerful currents. That would explain why giant squid living on opposite sides of the planet can be almost genetically identical. Ablett says the mistake is understandable, as so many of the supposed species were originally described from incomplete parts.</p><p>\"The entire world's population of giant squid may have evolved from a relatively recent population expansion, after a preceding population crash,\" says Ablett. Nobody knows what caused their population to shrink. The genetics only tells us that the population began growing some time between 110,000 and 730,000 years ago.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02f1g6n\"}}</p><p>So if the giant squid is not a true monster of the deep, are there any other contenders?</p><blockquote><p> It has swivelling hooks to help it catch fish </p></blockquote><p>The <a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/591284/overview\" target=\"_blank\">colossal squid</a>, first described in 1925, looks like a promising candidate for a gigantic sea monster. It might grow even larger than giant squid. The largest specimen ever captured was only 8m long, but it seems to have been young so it may not have reached its full length.</p><p>Instead of teeth on its suckers, it has swivelling hooks to help it catch fish. But unlike the giant squid <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0025315409991494\" target=\"_blank\">it seems not to be an active predator</a>. Instead, the colossal squid floats around and uses its hooks to ensnare prey that stray too close.</p><p>What's more, the colossal squid only lives in the Antarctic seas, so they can't have been the inspiration for the Scandinavian kraken legends.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02f0699\"}}</p><p>Much more violent are the smaller <a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/403181/overview\" target=\"_blank\">Humboldt squid</a>, which are known as \"red devils\" because of <a href=\"http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/life/Humboldt_Squid\" target=\"_blank\">the colour they flash when in attack mode</a>. They are more aggressive than giant squid and have been known to attack humans.</p><blockquote><p> They certainly couldn't drag fishermen from boats </p></blockquote><p>Roper once had a lucky escape, when a Humboldt squid came \"gouging with her sharp beak through my wetsuit\". Some years before, he had been told the story of a Mexican fisherman who fell overboard into a school of actively feeding Humboldt squid. \"As he reached upwards for his mate to pull him aboard, he was attacked and pulled beneath the seas and was never seen again, having become a meal for the hungry school of squid,\" says Roper. \"I considered myself quite fortunate to have come out of the water in more or less one piece.\"</p><p>However, while the Humboldt squid is clearly dangerous, even at maximum length they are hardly bigger than a human. So they don't pose a serious threat unless you happen to be in the water with them. They certainly couldn't drag fishermen from boats, as the kraken legend claims.</p><p>All in all, there is little evidence of a truly monstrous squid living in the ocean today. But there is reason to suspect that squid reached stupendous sizes in the distant past.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dzdpj\"}}</p><p>According to <a href=\"https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/facultyprofiles/ma_mcmenamin\" target=\"_blank\">Mark McMenamin</a> of Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Massachusetts, during the early dinosaur era there may have been whopping squids up to 30m long. These prehistoric krakens may have preyed on ichthyosaurs, giant marine reptiles that looked a bit like modern dolphins.</p><p>McMenamin first presented this idea in 2011. He found <a href=\"http://www.geosociety.org/news/pr/11-65.htm\" target=\"_blank\">nine fossilised vertebrae from ichthyosaurs</a>, arranged in linear patterns that, he argues, resemble the pattern of the \"sucker discs on cephalic tentacles\". He suggests that a kraken \"killed the marine reptiles and then dragged their carcasses back to its lair\" for a feast, arranging the bones in near-geometric patterns.</p><blockquote><p> There were periods in the past when squids became very large </p></blockquote><p>It's a speculative idea. In its defence, McMenamin points out that modern cephalopods are some of the most intelligent creatures at sea, and that octopuses have been known to collect rocks in their dens. However, his critics point out that there is no evidence that modern cephalopods stockpile their prey.</p><p>McMenamin has now found a fossil that he believes to be part of the tip of an ancient squid-beak. He presented his findings at the Geological Society of America. \"We think we're seeing a very close connection between the deep structure of a particular group of modern squid and this Triassic giant,\" says McMenamin. \"What it tells us is there were periods in the past when squids became very large.\"</p><p>However, other palaeontologists remain to be convinced. So far, it is not clear if there truly were gigantic squid in the seas of the past.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dzdy9\"}}</p><p>Today's giant squid, however, seemingly has all the ingredients needed to make a monster. But rather than the reality of the animal, it's our perception, muddied by stories, that keep the kraken alive.</p><blockquote><p> We may never quite know what's down there </p></blockquote><p>Perhaps the squid remain so mysterious, almost mythical, because they are so elusive and lurk so deep. \"Humans need their monsters,\" says Roper. Giant squid are so big, and are such \"creepy-looking animals\", that it is easy to turn them into the violent beasts of our imagination.</p><p>But even if giant squid are gentle giants, the ocean itself remains deeply mysterious. Only 5% of it has been explored, and new discoveries are still being made. The <a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/218968/overview\" target=\"_blank\">megamouth shark</a> is over 5m long, and has a face no one would ever forget, but it was only discovered in 1976.</p><p>We may never quite know what's down there, says Widder. It's perfectly possible that there is something much bigger and scarier than giant squid lurking in depths far beyond human reach.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02f7qgc\"}}</p>","BusinessUnit":"bbc.com","CalloutBody":"","CalloutPosition":"","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"","Campaign":null,"Collection":[{"Content":{"AssetImage":[],"Campaign":null,"CollectionOverrides":null,"CollectionType":"column","Description":"The natural world is more beguiling than you think","Name":"Strange & Beautiful","Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Title":"Strange & Beautiful","CreationDateTime":"2015-08-31T16:04:08.809567Z","Entity":"collection","Guid":"3d7245cf-cf6e-4341-8e99-d0d0fe282b83","Id":"wwearth/column/strange-and-beautiful","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T14:51:56.821292Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"column/strange-and-beautiful"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2015-08-31T16:04:08.809567Z","Entity":"collection","Guid":"3d7245cf-cf6e-4341-8e99-d0d0fe282b83","Id":"wwearth/column/strange-and-beautiful","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T14:51:56.821292Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"column/strange-and-beautiful"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:collection:wwearth/column/strange-and-beautiful","_id":"5a3ce0b8b22216e32f3170ff"}],"DisableAdverts":false,"DisplayDate":"2014-12-12T09:33:13Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"Are massive squid really the sea monsters of legend?","HeadlineShort":"Hunt for real-life sea monster","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"For centuries people have spun tales of sea monsters with giant tentacles that drag people to their doom. Is there any truth to the stories?","IsSyndicated":true,"Latitude":"","Location":null,"Longitude":"","Option":null,"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Programme":null,"RelatedStory":[{"Content":{"AssetCustom":"","AssetIbroadcast":null,"AssetImage":[],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":[],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":[],"BodyHtml":"<p>It's a Battle Royale; one of nature's great confrontations.</p><p>Under the waves cruises a pod of orcas, huge, sleek predators, each around 8 metres long and weighing some 6 tonnes. Each with big jaws, full of teeth.</p><p>They are hunting a great baleen whale, one of the largest animals that has ever lived.</p><p>Such life-or-death battles, between orcas and whales, have captured the popular imagination.</p><p>But the truth is more complicated.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dtl0g\"}}</p><p>For a start it has been unclear whether orcas, also known as killer whales, really hunt whales, and how often. Nor did we know how the whales themselves might react to such attacks.</p><p>Now for the first time, scientists have recorded orcas attacking and killing humpback whales, specifically young calves. The results are published in the journal <em><a title=\"Marine Mammal Science\" href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/mms.12182\" target=\"_blank\">Marine Mammal Science</a></em>.</p><p>What's more, the humpback whales themselves aren't passive victims. They aggressively turn to battle the orcas, and even recruit \"escort\" whales to help fight off the attacks.</p><p><strong>Rare sightings</strong></p><p>Orcas have developed a reputation for preying on baleen whales, a group that includes blue, fin and humpback whales among others. They have been recorded attempting to attack almost every species, and also sperm whales, the largest species of toothed whale.</p><p>Many whales display tooth marks made by orcas on their tails and flippers, suggesting such attacks are common.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dtksf\"}}</p><p>But with a few notable exceptions, including times when orcas have preyed upon grey whale calves, successful attacks by orcas on whales have rarely been documented.</p><p>For example, humpback whales are among the most studied large whales, being observed for countless hours at sea by scientists. More orca tooth marks are found on humpbacks than any other whale species. But until now there was no scientific record of an orca killing a humpback whale.</p><p>Research over recent decades has also revealed a range of orca populations around the world, each hunting different prey using different techniques. Many don't hunt whales at all. Some orcas for example, particularly those living in northern latitudes including the North Pacific and Antarctica, only hunt fish, while others exclusively hunt seals.</p><p>But now researchers have observed the action close up.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dtlng\"}}</p><p><a title=\"Robert Pitman, NOAA\" href=\"https://swfsc.noaa.gov/staff.aspx?id=818\" target=\"_blank\">Robert Pitman</a>, a marine biologist based at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, in La Jolla, California and colleagues from the US and Australia, tracked orcas and humpback whales off the coast of Western Australia.</p><p>They observed orcas attempting 22 separate attacks on humpback whales.</p><p>On 14 occasions, the orcas attacked and killed a humpback whale calf.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dtg20\"}}</p><p>To investigate further, the scientists attached a tracker to a female orca, which allowed them to use satellites to monitor her movements. They followed her for six days.</p><p>During that time, her pod attacked eight humpback whale calves. During the seven attacks in which the researchers witnessed the outcome, the orcas killed the humpback whale calf on three occasions.</p><p>That suggests that, for this population of orcas at least, humpback whales are a predictable and plentiful prey, although the orcas were only seen attacking calves and not adult whales.</p><p>But the story doesn't end there.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dtkwy\"}}</p><p>Baleen whales themselves are popularly thought to be large but generally unassuming, passive creatures. Pitman's study reveals another side to their character.</p><p>When chased by orcas, certain species of baleen whale are known to try to outswim their pursuers. Blue, fin and minke whales are thought to do this, sprinting at high speed so that the orcas can't keep up.</p><p>On some occasions, the humpback whales seen by Pitman's team sought out protection. They swam to shallow water, nearby reefs, or even under the researchers' boats. These tactics often curtailed the attack.</p><p>But at other times, the humpback whales decided to stay and fight.</p><p>As the orcas approached, the mother humpback would sometimes move her calf to her side, or lift it out of the water using her head or flippers. She also blew huge breaths of air to disturb the orcas, and lunged or charged at them, slashing and slapping her tail and flippers.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02dtl51\"}}</p><p>Perhaps most surprising, humpback whales also have adult \"escorts\" that try to protect calves that are not their own, joining the mother in defending the smaller whale. These escort whales either charged at the orcas, or placed themselves between the attackers and calf, thrashing their tails and flippers.</p><p>It is not yet clear whether escort whales are related to the calves and if not, how they might benefit from defending them.</p><p>Despite the efforts of the mother whales and escorts, the orcas were more often than not successful in their attacks. But the presence of the escorts did reduce how many times a whale calf was killed.</p><p>In light of their study, the researchers believe that orcas may congregate each year off the coast of Western Australia to prey on baby humpback whales.</p><p>Humpbacks usually give birth to one calf every two years, so each calf killed is a significant loss to a mother.</p><p>Follow <a title=\"Twitter\" href=\"https://twitter.com/bymjwalker\" target=\"_blank\">Matt Walker</a> and <a title=\"Twitter\" href=\"https://twitter.com/bbcearth\" target=\"_blank\">BBC Earth</a> on Twitter.</p>","BusinessUnit":"bbc.com","CalloutBody":"","CalloutPosition":"","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"","Campaign":null,"Collection":[],"DisableAdverts":false,"DisplayDate":"2014-12-08T16:45:59Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"Orcas and whales seen in fight to the death","HeadlineShort":"Orcas and whales in epic battle","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"New research reveals how orcas attack baleen whales, and how the whales fight back","IsSyndicated":true,"Latitude":"","Location":null,"Longitude":"","Option":null,"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Programme":null,"RelatedStory":[],"RelatedTag":[],"StoryType":"image","SummaryLong":"New research reveals how orcas attack baleen whales, and how the whales fight back","SummaryShort":"How orcas attack, and whales fight back","SuperSection":null,"Tag":[]},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2014-12-08T16:45:59Z","Entity":"story","Guid":"d77ad289-ff05-4689-81f9-bb9a5a8551b1","Id":"wwearth/story/20141209-orcas-and-whales-in-epic-battle","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-10-27T12:19:30.091408Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"20141209-orcas-and-whales-in-epic-battle"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:story:wwearth/story/20141209-orcas-and-whales-in-epic-battle","_id":"5a42bfdeb22216e32f3670a5"},{"Content":{"AssetCustom":"","AssetIbroadcast":null,"AssetImage":[],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":[],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":[],"BodyHtml":"<p>Each month, fishermen in the Gulf of Thailand risk their lives harvesting live sea snakes. It's risky for both parties: the snakes are in danger of being over-harvested and the fishermen could get bitten.</p><p>Scientists are now calling for a monitoring programme to assess the impact the on-going trade will have on their population numbers and to look how it affects the ecosystem.</p><p>A team <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/cobi.12387\">reports in the journal <em>Conservation Biology</em></a> that fishermen have noticed a decline in their population since 2009. The researchers now want to understand if this is due to overfishing or other factors like pollution.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02ddy98\"}}</p><p>The fishermen fish for squid with nets and hooks, and at the same time pick up hundreds of deadly sea snakes. The snakes have particularly potent venoms, which can be lethal.</p><p>Most of the fishing occurs at night, in small boats with crews of seven to 25. They use the luminous light of electric lamps to attract the squids. These lights are also believed to appeal to the snakes, which are fished out of the water at the same time.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02ddydm\"}}</p><p>The trade has grown considerably. Around 20 years ago there were only 20-30 fishing vessels hunting for sea snakes. Today there are more like 700 and each year they bring in 80 tonnes of sea snakes. Over seven different species are routinely caught, but most of the catch is <a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/794153/overview\">Hardwick's sea snakes</a> and <a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/1056262/overview%20\">black-banded sea snakes</a>.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02ddyq5\"}}</p><p>At shore the snakes are quickly weighed and sorted by size. A typical merchant can categorise 20-30 kg of snake in a few minutes. Given that a small snake weighs about 500g, they may sort through 60 live snakes in less than five minutes, using only their bare hands. They also sometimes walk barefoot in large basins full of live sea snakes.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02ddyld\"}}</p><p>Bites are an occupational hazard and there is a serious shortage of anti-venom in the region. If someone gets bitten, they quickly pierce their skin with a razor blade to extract the venom. People also treat bites with garlic and grated rhinoceros horn, which have no proven medical benefits.</p><p>The economic benefit to the fishers and merchants \"clearly outweighs\" the risk of being bitten, says <a href=\"http://zoltantakacs.com/\">Zoltan Takacs</a> of the National Geographic Society and co-author of the new paper. His team saw seven bites during two trading sessions, though no one was killed.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02ddytd\"}}</p><p>No part of the snake goes to waste. It is consumed as food, drink or medicine elsewhere in Asia, often exported to China and Vietnam.</p><p>Snake meat is a delicacy. It can be fried or eaten in soups, and the heart and liver are considered beneficial to pregnant women.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02ddy58\"}}</p><p>Sometimes snake is submerged in rice wine and served as a drink. The blood can also be mixed with alcohol. People believe it brings them health benefits. People also make \"sea snake glue\", which is marketed as curing a range of conditions including joint and back pain, insomnia and anorexia.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p02ddyzy\"}}</p><p>Takacs' team is worried that over-harvesting could deplete the populations of some species. \"We have no idea of the true magnitude of the damage the [fishing] may have on snakes and the ecosystem of the Gulf of Thailand,\" says Takacs.</p>","BusinessUnit":"bbc.com","CalloutBody":"","CalloutPosition":"","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"","Campaign":null,"Collection":[],"DisableAdverts":false,"DisplayDate":"2014-12-05T10:54:33Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"Extreme fishing: Hunting for deadly sea snakes","HeadlineShort":"Fishing for deadly sea snakes","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"Every year 80 tonnes of venomous sea snakes are harvested in the Gulf of Thailand, but it's a dangerous business and the snakes might be threatened.","IsSyndicated":true,"Latitude":"","Location":null,"Longitude":"","Option":null,"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Programme":null,"RelatedStory":[],"RelatedTag":[],"StoryType":"image","SummaryLong":"Every year 80 tonnes of venomous sea snakes are harvested in the Gulf of Thailand, but it's a dangerous business and the snakes might be threatened ","SummaryShort":"Fishermen are catching venomous sea snakes ","SuperSection":null,"Tag":[]},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2014-12-05T10:54:33Z","Entity":"story","Guid":"13aca929-5e49-4165-8c6c-505a6d7d61e4","Id":"wwearth/story/20141204-fishing-for-deadly-sea-snakes","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T09:04:33.667806Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"20141204-fishing-for-deadly-sea-snakes"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:story:wwearth/story/20141204-fishing-for-deadly-sea-snakes","_id":"5a433a74b22216e32f36b0cb"},{"Content":{"AssetCustom":"","AssetIbroadcast":null,"AssetImage":[],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":[],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":[],"BodyHtml":"<p>They can be as big as great white sharks, but that's about as far as the comparison goes. Their maximum speed is a lethargic 1.7 miles per hour, many are almost blind, and they are happy to eat rotting carcasses. They may be common throughout the ocean, but you've probably never heard of them. Meet the Greenland shark.</p><p>Looking like nothing so much as a chunk of weather-beaten rock, Greenland sharks (<em><a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/205932/overview\" target=\"_blank\">Somniosus microcephalus</a></em>) can grow up to 7.3 metres (24 feet) long, making them one of the largest of all fish, and the biggest in the Arctic. But they prefer to live in deep, cold water, so humans rarely see them.</p><p>Studies in the Arctic have revealed a few snippets of information about Greenland sharks, and more data is now starting to come in from elsewhere. It turns out that Greenland sharks are bizarre, and may be crucially important for the ocean ecosystem.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p0299y36\"}}</p><p>Greenland sharks only come close to the surface in places where the shallow water is frigid enough for them –  <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1095-8649.2012.03257.x\" target=\"_blank\">primarily in the Arctic</a>. They are most easily seen around Greenland and Iceland. As a result, they were long thought of as purely polar animals, as were the closely-related <a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/209687/overview\" target=\"_blank\">Pacific sleeper shark</a> and <a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/8877002/overview\" target=\"_blank\">southern sleeper shark</a>.</p><p>But they have been reported on the coasts of Canada, Portugal, France, Scotland and Scandinavia. Some researchers think they live in many other areas too but just haven't been spotted in them yet.</p><p>\"They may be everywhere that's cold enough and deep enough,\" says <a href=\"http://data.aims.gov.au/staffcv/jsf/external/view.xhtml?partyId=900003203\" target=\"_blank\">Aaron MacNeil</a> of the Australian Institute of Marine Science, in Townsville, Queensland.</p><p>The obvious way to see a Greenland shark in the wild is to dive into the deep sea. For instance, in 2001 a remotely operated vehicle in the Gulf of Mexico captured footage of <a href=\"http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/umrsmas/bullmar/2007/00000080/00000002/art00004\" target=\"_blank\">either a Greenland shark or a sleeper shark</a> in over 2,600 metres (8,530ft) of water.</p><blockquote><p> They may be everywhere that's cold enough and deep enough </p></blockquote><p>Two years later, a pilot and a scientist from the Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institution in Fort Pierce, Florida, became the first people to come face to face with a Greenland shark in the deep sea. The shark, which was five metres (16ft) long, <a href=\"http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2003/10/031016064024.htm\" target=\"_blank\">bumped into their submersible vessel</a> 1,000 metres (3,280ft) down in the Gulf of Maine.</p><p>But hardly anyone dives that deep. So these rare encounters can't tell us how widespread and important the Greenland sharks are.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p029b2v8\"}}</p><p>However, if the history of fishing is any guide, Greenland sharks are common as muck. The sharks were fished from the early 20th century until the 1960s; mainly for their liver oil, which was used as lamp fuel and industrial lubricant. In some years, over 30,000 were taken. That suggests a very healthy population.</p><p>In line with that, a recent expedition used 120 hooks on a longline, and caught 59 sharks. \"I think they're fairly common,\" says <a href=\"http://www1.uwindsor.ca/glier/aaron-fisk\" target=\"_blank\">Aaron Fisk</a> of the University of Windsor in Ontario. \"When we want to catch them we don't have any trouble.\"</p><p>So what are all these Greenland sharks eating? To find out, scientists have to get their hands dirty - <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5xTG9sDyqA\" target=\"_blank\">by cutting open the sharks' stomachs and pulling out the remains of their meals</a>.</p><blockquote><p> It seems the sharks aren't too concerned about the freshness of their meals </p></blockquote><p>So far this kind of work suggests the menu of the Greenland shark is highly varied. As well as fish, they eat just about anything that might fall off the ice, including reindeer and polar bears.</p><p>Given a chance it seems they will even try to eat moose. Last November, a man in Newfoundland found a Greenland shark gagging on a piece of moose hide, which had probably been thrown into the water by a hunter. He and another man decided to save the shark from choking on the hunk of moose. \"<a href=\"http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/moose-eating-shark-rescued-in-newfoundland-harbour-1.2434102\" target=\"_blank\">A couple yanks and it just came right out</a>,\" he told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.</p><p>It seems the sharks aren't too concerned about the freshness of their meals. Researchers have found small crustaceans called amphipods in their stomachs. These critters swarm over dead bodies in deep waters, so finding them hints that the sharks sometimes eat carrion.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p0299zfc\"}}</p><p>That would make sense, because it's hard to understand how a Greenland shark could ever catch living prey.</p><p>For one thing they are absurdly slow, moving more sluggishly than any other shark. One satellite tagging study found that <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jembe.2012.04.021\" target=\"_blank\">they usually meander about at around 0.8mph (1.1kph)</a>, accelerating to 1.7mph (2.7kph) when going all out. Others say <a href=\"http://www.geerg.ca/gshark_1.html#Swimming_Speed\" target=\"_blank\">they can reach 2.2mph (3.5kph)</a>. Regardless, many of the things they might want to eat can swim faster.</p><p>If that wasn't enough, many Greenland sharks appear to be almost blind. The culprit is <a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/1037051/overview\" target=\"_blank\"><em>Ommatokoita elongata</em></a>, a crustacean with the nasty habit of permanently attaching itself to the front of the sharks’ eyes, damaging their corneas (see the photo above). In some populations, 90% of Greenland sharks carry these parasites. The shark that rammed the Harbor Branch submersible had them dangling from its eyes.</p><p>So how do Greenland sharks catch anything? It has been suggested that <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/191829a0\" target=\"_blank\">the parasitic crustaceans might be bioluminescent</a>, and that the light they give off attracts fish for the shark. But that's \"poppycock\", says <a href=\"http://www.mtsu.edu/biology/faculty/benz.php\" target=\"_blank\">George Benz</a> at Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro. He says the scientific literature on the sharks is \"contaminated\" with unsubstantiated claims like this.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p029b4nv\"}}</p><p>Benz thinks the sharks are more likely to be ambush predators. For example, Arctic seals sometimes sleep in the water to avoid polar bears, potentially allowing Greenlands to sneak up on them.</p><p>The seals also have to poke their heads through ice holes to breathe, giving the sharks an opportunity to catch them unawares. \"They can still see light and dark, and a hole in the ice is like a big flashlight that says where the food comes in,\" says MacNeil.</p><p>No one has directly observed Greenland sharks catching seals in this way, but there is some circumstantial evidence. Large numbers of dead seals with \"corkscrew\" wounds have been recovered at Sable Island off the coast of Nova Scotia. Some were bitten in half, while others had the skin and blubber stripped from the lower halves of their bodies. \"We're thinking those are Greenland shark bites,\" says MacNeil. \"When they bite, the seal spins to get away, stripping the blubber away literally as it's trying to get out.\"</p><blockquote><p> A hole in the ice is like a big flashlight that says where the food comes in </p></blockquote><p>Others are unconvinced, arguing <a href=\"http://www.geerg.ca/edit_20101006.html\" target=\"_blank\">the seals were chopped up by propeller blades</a>.</p><p>Whether or not the Greenland shark is the \"Corkscrew Killer\", Fisk has evidence that the species eats seals aplenty. He knew that seals in Svalbard have a short average lifespan despite seemingly ideal conditions: humans don't hunt them, they have few known predators, they aren't being accidentally caught by fishermen, and the area is not polluted. Wondering what was killing the seals, his team carried out stomach analyses on 45 Greenland sharks, and found that <a href=\"http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00227-013-2174-z\" target=\"_blank\">about a third contained the remains of seals</a>. That was enough to explain the shorter lifespans.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p029b5f2\"}}</p><p>Perhaps surprisingly, Greenland sharks may also tackle much bigger prey: whales.</p><p>Fisk's stomach analyses showed that they eat the discarded leftovers from Norwegian whale hunts. And it's not just dead whales they'll go after. Fisk has photographs of a group of <a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/328541/overview\" target=\"_blank\">beluga whales</a> that came to a grisly end after becoming trapped by shifting ice off Baffin Island, northern Canada. \"The polar bears went to town,\" he says, and so did Greenland sharks. \"There were definitely Greenland bites on those beluga.\"</p><p>All this suggests Greenland sharks are playing a big role in the Arctic food web. If they are as common as everyone now suspects, they would have a big impact on other animals, says Fisk.</p><p>That may also be true in their deeper habitats, even if they get most of their food from sinking corpses. Benz says the sharks could be helping provide food for a wide range of other animals by breaking up these larger chunks of flesh. \"A lot of organisms are going to benefit,\" he says.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p029bbjw\"}}</p><p>If Greenland sharks are so important to the waters they live in, it would be good to know what is going to happen to them. \"I think we need to think a little more about Greenland sharks,\" says Fisk.</p><p>In theory there are two things that could cause a problem: overfishing, and climate change.</p><blockquote><p> Hákarl is either an acquired taste, or a contender for the most disgusting food on the planet </p></blockquote><p>However, fishing seems unlikely to pose a major threat to the sharks. For one thing their meat is toxic, because it is rife with unsavory organic contaminants. So Greenland sharks are not regarded as a good dining option. In 1968, a group of sled dogs was fed Greenland shark flesh. Reportedly they were left walking stiffly, hyper-salivating and vomiting - not to mention having muscular convulsions, respiratory distress, and explosive diarrhoea. Some died.</p><p>A small number of Greenlands do get caught, to supply demand for an Icelandic delicacy called hákarl, or fermented shark. The meat is detoxified through a multi-week rotting process. Hákarl, MacNeil says, is an \"acquired taste\". Others have described it as a contender for the most disgusting food on the planet. It probably won't catch on enough to threaten the species.</p><p>Fishermen might catch the sharks by accident, though. From the late 1980s, the Inuit returned to fishing for <a href=\"http://eol.org/pages/223542/overview\" target=\"_blank\">Greenland halibut</a> as a means of preserving their culture. Greenland sharks try to snatch free meals from the fishing hooks, and can get wrapped up in the lines.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p029bbyy\"}}</p><p>That leaves climate change. Perhaps its most dramatic effect is the rapid retreat of the Arctic sea ice, particularly in the summer. What will that mean for the sharks?</p><p>As the summer ice levels decrease, the window for fishing grows larger. So while the halibut fishing has been limited so far, that could soon change. Large commercial fishing operators are well aware of this opportunity.</p><blockquote><p> If we have ice-free summers, the food web could change dramatically </p></blockquote><p>But the effects of the retreating ice go far beyond a few fishing boats. The entire Arctic ecosystem revolves around the sea ice. For the Greenland sharks, ice acts as a food delivery device. It's what keeps seals over open water, and as it melts it delivers dead animals as potential meals. That food source could be drastically cut as the ice shrinks ever further.</p><p>But other animals, particularly fish from further south, are migrating into the Arctic. Might the Greenland sharks start eating them? As so little is known about the sharks, it's difficult to say what will happen. All we can say for sure is that the Greenland sharks will be living in a very different Arctic in a few decades' time.</p><p>\"If we have ice-free summers, as predicted in the near term,\" says MacNeil, \"the food web could change dramatically.\"</p>","BusinessUnit":"worldwide","CalloutBody":"","CalloutPosition":"","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"","Campaign":null,"Collection":[],"DisableAdverts":false,"DisplayDate":"2014-10-24T13:51:50Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"Mysterious giant sharks may be everywhere","HeadlineShort":"The mystery shark of the Arctic","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"Greenland sharks are absurdly slow and mostly blind, yet they may have spread far beyond the Arctic waters they are known from","IsSyndicated":true,"Latitude":"","Location":null,"Longitude":"","Option":null,"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Programme":null,"RelatedStory":[],"RelatedTag":[],"StoryType":"image","SummaryLong":"Greenland sharks are absurdly slow and mostly blind, yet they may have spread far beyond the poles","SummaryShort":"Greenland sharks are slow and mostly blind, yet they may be everywhere","SuperSection":null,"Tag":[]},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2014-10-24T13:51:50Z","Entity":"story","Guid":"405e6370-8226-4140-8e4d-024f7af601a9","Id":"wwearth/story/20141028-the-mystery-shark-of-the-arctic","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T09:07:19.105151Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"20141028-the-mystery-shark-of-the-arctic"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:story:wwearth/story/20141028-the-mystery-shark-of-the-arctic","_id":"5a41a6c9b22216e32f35dfab"}],"RelatedTag":[{"Content":{"AssetImage":null,"Description":"","LinkUrl":"","Name":"Squid"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2014-12-10T11:18:19Z","Entity":"tag","Guid":"705e1ff1-7480-45d2-9f17-f98e79b47ce6","Id":"tag/squid","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T09:10:31.240523Z","Project":"","Slug":"squid"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:tag:tag/squid","_id":"5a3ce47cb22216e32f334dfc"}],"StoryType":"image","SummaryLong":"For centuries people have spun tales of sea monsters with giant tentacles that drag people to their doom. Is there any truth to the stories?","SummaryShort":"Are giant squid the terrors of the deep?","SuperSection":null,"Tag":[{"Content":{"AssetImage":null,"Description":"","LinkUrl":"","Name":"Oceans","CreationDateTime":"2014-09-06T11:08:22Z","Entity":"tag","Guid":"9978e052-ba71-45fe-afe0-dd7c3a405c71","Id":"tag/oceans","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T09:13:29.403517Z","Project":"","Slug":"oceans"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2014-09-06T11:08:22Z","Entity":"tag","Guid":"9978e052-ba71-45fe-afe0-dd7c3a405c71","Id":"tag/oceans","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T09:13:29.403517Z","Project":"","Slug":"oceans"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:tag:tag/oceans","_id":"5a3ce482b22216e32f3351e6"}],"CreationDateTime":"2014-12-12T09:33:13Z","Entity":"story","Guid":"a25a8e67-cb66-47cd-beb6-c1c749b5ea74","Id":"wwearth/story/20141212-quest-for-the-real-life-kraken","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T09:14:03.055822Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"20141212-quest-for-the-real-life-kraken"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2014-12-12T09:33:13Z","Entity":"story","Guid":"a25a8e67-cb66-47cd-beb6-c1c749b5ea74","Id":"wwearth/story/20141212-quest-for-the-real-life-kraken","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T09:14:03.055822Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"20141212-quest-for-the-real-life-kraken"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:story:wwearth/story/20141212-quest-for-the-real-life-kraken","_id":"5a41478bb22216e32f35add0"},{"Content":{"AssetCustom":"","AssetIbroadcast":null,"AssetImage":[{"Content":{"Copyright":"Alamy","FileSizeBytes":1066416,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":648,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/28/l4/p028l45l.jpg","SourceWidth":1600,"SynopsisLong":"Gladstone peninsula during the coral spawning period (credit: Alamy)","SynopsisMedium":"Gladstone peninsula during the coral spawning period (credit: Alamy)","SynopsisShort":"Gladstone peninsula during the coral spawning period (credit: Alamy)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/28/l4/p028l45l.jpg","Title":"Gladstone peninsula","CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p028l45l","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p028l45l","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p028l45l","_id":"5a3ee0d7b22216e32f346cb5"}],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":[{"Content":{"Copyright":"Auscape / UIG / Getty Images","FileSizeBytes":1774201,"MimeType":"image/jpeg","SourceHeight":1080,"SourceUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://deltaorigin.bbc.co.uk/images/live/p0/28/l4/p028l4jd.jpg","SourceWidth":1920,"SynopsisLong":"Hard coral spawning on the Great Barrier Reef (credit: Auscape / UIG / Getty Images)","SynopsisMedium":"Hard coral spawning on the Great Barrier Reef (credit: Auscape / UIG / Getty Images)","SynopsisShort":"Hard coral spawning on the Great Barrier Reef (credit: Auscape / UIG / Getty Images)","TemplateUrl":"https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/$recipe/images/live/p0/28/l4/p028l4jd.jpg","Title":"Hard coral spawning"},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Entity":"","Guid":"","Id":"p028l4jd","ModifiedDateTime":"0001-01-01T00:00:00Z","Project":"","Slug":""},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:image:p028l4jd","_id":"5a43ad0eb22216e32f36ed08"}],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":null,"BodyHtml":"<p>The Great Barrier Reef off the north-east coast of Australia is the largest living organism visible from space. It stretches for 1,430 miles and is made up of over 3,000 reefs of coral colonies, many of which have synchronised for their best shot at reproduction.</p><p>Spawning occurs when corals release sperm and eggs into the water column. Eggs float upwards to the surface of the water and sperm swim to find and fertilise them. Once fertilised the eggs develop into larvae before settling down to the seabed to start a colony of their own.</p><p>The phenomenon happens in springtime on the Great Barrier Reef, when water temperatures have risen enough to stimulate the sex cells to mature. In Western Australia the coral spawn in autumn, with some northern reefs reproducing in both seasons.</p><p>Spawning only takes place after the full moon, when tidal conditions are at their calmest allowing the eggs and sperm to float freely rather than just wash up on shore. The cover of night also helps reduce the chances of eggs being eaten by daytime predators but ultimately the mass spawning is an example of safety in numbers: by releasing all of their eggs at the same time, coral overwhelm their predators who can only eat a limited amount.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p028l4jd\"}}</p><p>This synchronised effort is particularly impressive for so-called primitive organisms without eyes. Investigating Australian corals, Dr Oren Levy, Dr Bill Leggat and Prof Ove Hoegh-Guldberg discovered they have a sensitivity to blue light which explains how they respond to the lunar cycle.</p><p>Analysis of the mass spawning is a fairly recent field because, despite it occurring for thousands of years, it was only recorded for the first time in 1981. Now divers eagerly attend the annual event, describing it as an ‘underwater snowstorm’ where clouds of eggs and sperm drift through the water. The sex cells come from the corals’ guts, they effectively spit out a plume of thousands of pellets mostly in hues of red, yellow and orange.</p><p>It all culminates on the surface of the ocean in pink-tinged slicks, which can measure several miles long and are even visible in satellite images. No wonder they call it the greatest sex show on Earth!</p>","BusinessUnit":"public service","CalloutBody":"","CalloutPosition":"","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"","Campaign":null,"Collection":null,"DisableAdverts":false,"DisplayDate":"2014-10-13T11:22:36Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"Australia’s reefs are in the pink","HeadlineShort":"Australia’s reefs in the pink","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"Every year, giant pink slicks appear on the ocean around Australia in the sexual spectacular that is mass coral spawning.","IsSyndicated":false,"Latitude":"","Location":null,"Longitude":"","Option":null,"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Programme":null,"RelatedStory":[{"Content":{"AssetCustom":"","AssetIbroadcast":null,"AssetImage":[],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":[],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":null,"BodyHtml":"<p>In nature’s word-association game, Brazil is immediately paired with rainforest. It is home to over one-third of the world’s remaining rainforest, a habitat unmatched for the diverse conditions it provides for an incredible variety of life.</p><p>An estimated 30% of all species on Earth are thought to live in the Amazon rainforest including 40,000 different plant species, 430 mammal species and a staggering 2.5 million insect species with new discoveries being made every year. Almost two-thirds of this – the largest and arguably best known rainforest in the world – is found in Brazil.</p><p>The single thing that unites every plant and animal species in this unqie habitat is a dependence on precipitation. The reason it rains so much in the Amazon is partly down to its position on Earth: the heat along the equator evaporates moisture from the forest and from the Atlantic Ocean, the latter blown in by eastern trade winds. The evaporated water rises and condenses to form constant rain clouds which release torrential downpours and the cycle repeats.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p028kwxf\"}}</p><p>Winding its way through the rainforest is the second longest river in the world at approximately 4,000 miles from source to sea. The Amazon is the world's biggest river in volume, and unique species including pink dolphins – or boto – and red-bellied piranhas swim in these waters. The river plays an essential role in the area’s water cycle, carrying excess from the forest out to sea.</p><p>Travelling south from the Amazon Basin you encounter the vast Pantanal, one of the largest freshwater wetland systems on Earth. Here the run-off from the Planalto highlands is distributed in to the Paraguay river and tributaries creating marshes and lakes. The regular pattern of flooding and drought across the plains supports a magnificent spectrum of life such as helicopter damselflies, giant river otters, jaguars and hyacinth macaws.</p><p>Further south again, at the border with Argentina, are the stunning Iguazu Falls. The Iguazu river cascades 80 metres in 275 individual drops, forming a horseshoe-shaped waterfall. Giant anteaters, tapir and howler monkeys live in the surrounding sub-tropical rainforest, which is kept moist by the clouds of spray from the waterfall.</p><p>It may only be the fifth-largest country in the world, but Brazil definitely wins the title of the wettest, wildest land on Earth.</p>","BusinessUnit":"public service","CalloutBody":"","CalloutPosition":"","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"","Campaign":null,"Collection":null,"DisableAdverts":false,"DisplayDate":"2014-10-12T21:53:46Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"Wet and wild Brazil","HeadlineShort":"Wet and wild Brazil","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"Brazil is not the biggest country in the world by area or human population, but it does boast the highest figures for biodiversity thanks largely to its super-sized water features.","IsSyndicated":false,"Latitude":"","Location":null,"Longitude":"","Option":null,"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Programme":null,"RelatedStory":[],"RelatedTag":null,"StoryType":"image","SummaryLong":"Brazil boasts the greatest biodiversity of any country on Earth thanks to its super-sized water features","SummaryShort":"Why water is key to Brazil’s biodiversity","SuperSection":null,"Tag":null},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2014-10-12T21:53:46Z","Entity":"story","Guid":"37537c31-1ad2-40e6-a7bd-f589b25a6fe9","Id":"wwearth/story/20141009-wet-and-wild-brazil","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T09:06:36.895196Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"20141009-wet-and-wild-brazil"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:story:wwearth/story/20141009-wet-and-wild-brazil","_id":"5a44bad4b22216e32f3779a7"},{"Content":{"AssetCustom":"","AssetIbroadcast":null,"AssetImage":[],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":[],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":null,"BodyHtml":"<p>Zambia is a landlocked country in south central Africa, characterised by savannah grasslands. Elephants, rhinoceros, lions, giraffes and great migrating herds of wildebeest live wild here. They are all dependent on the flow of the country’s rivers, where hippopotamus and crocodiles can also be found.</p><p>A world-renowned natural feature also attracts hundreds of thousands of tourists to Zambia every year. At the border with Zimbabwe, the Zambezi River drops 108 metres, creating the world’s biggest curtain of water at 1,708 metres wide. This is Victoria Falls, one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World and a UNESCO World Heritage site.</p><blockquote><p> The spray generated as the river crashes down reaches over 500 metres high and can be seen  over 30 miles away </p></blockquote><p>The waterfall is known locally as Mosi-oa-Tunya: the smoke that thunders. The spray generated as the full volume of the river crashes down the basalt cliffs reaches over 500 metres high and can be seen over 30 miles away.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p0289mct\"}}</p><p>As the sun dips below the horizon, most of the tourists will depart but on full moon nights, those in the know wait for a night-time display. Thanks to the cloud of water vapour produced by the churning waterfall, Zambia is one of the most reliable places in the world to catch a moonbow.</p><p>Moonbows – also called lunar rainbows – are rare atmospheric phenomena, produced when sunlight reflected from the moon’s surface is refracted off moisture in the air. They are usually only seen by the naked eye as white arcs because the moonlight is too weak to stimulate the cone receptors in our eyes that would pick out the separate colours. However, through the magic of long exposure photography, a spectrum of colours is visible. At Victoria Falls there are various viewpoints that provide a perfect position for photographing a moonbow.</p><p>Purists will point out that these occurrences are not true lunar rainbows created when moonlight is refracted through rain or moisture-laden rainclouds. They argue that the conditions needed for a true moonbow make them rarer, much more transitory and harder to track down. Instead the spectacles visible at a number of waterfalls around the world are referred to as spray moonbows or false moonbows.</p><p>Whether true or false, no-one can argue that the sight of a multi-coloured crescent curving over the world’s biggest waterfall under a star-filled sky is one of nature’s greatest spectacles.</p>","BusinessUnit":"public service","CalloutBody":"","CalloutPosition":"","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"","Campaign":null,"Collection":null,"DisableAdverts":true,"DisplayDate":"2014-10-13T10:28:32Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"Zambia’s mythical moonbow","HeadlineShort":"Zambia’s mythical moonbow","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"South Africa might be the rainbow nation but travelling north across the continent you could find yourself in a moonbow nation.","IsSyndicated":false,"Latitude":"","Location":null,"Longitude":"","Option":null,"Partner":null,"PrimaryVertical":"wwearth","Programme":null,"RelatedStory":[],"RelatedTag":null,"StoryType":"image","SummaryLong":"South Africa might be the rainbow nation but travelling north across the continent you could find yourself in a moonbow nation.","SummaryShort":"The spectacular sight that mixes waterfalls and moonlight","SuperSection":null,"Tag":null},"Metadata":{"CreationDateTime":"2014-10-13T10:28:32Z","Entity":"story","Guid":"5a863787-8d37-429a-b5cf-fb84a2f5be7c","Id":"wwearth/story/20141016-zambias-mythical-moonbow","ModifiedDateTime":"2015-09-03T09:09:08.057209Z","Project":"wwearth","Slug":"20141016-zambias-mythical-moonbow"},"Urn":"urn:pubstack:jative:story:wwearth/story/20141016-zambias-mythical-moonbow","_id":"5a425bcdb22216e32f363cea"},{"Content":{"AssetCustom":"","AssetIbroadcast":null,"AssetImage":[],"AssetImagePromo":null,"AssetInfographic":"","AssetInline":[],"AssetSelect":"","AssetVideoIb2":null,"AssetVideoMps":null,"Author":null,"BodyHtml":"<p>On the west coast of South America, between the Andes Mountains and the Pacific Ocean, Chile borders Peru to the North, Bolivia in the North East and Argentina to the East. Its 2,700-mile long landscape ranges from barren desert to lush rainforest.</p><p>Chile is a hot spot for volcanic activity where the Nazca and Antarctic Plates are driven beneath the South American Plate. The chain of 2,000 volcanoes here is the second longest in the world and around 500 are thought to still be active with regular eruptions every year. At El Tatio in northern Chile, 80 geysers spew into the air, thrusting super-heated water upwards due to volcanic activity under the Earth’s crust.</p><p>You will also find the country’s driest region in the North: the formidable Atacama Desert, the highest and most arid non-polar desert on Earth. The area’s average rainfall is just 15mm per year and some weather stations here have never recorded any rain at all. The Atacama spans 600 miles between the Andes and Chilean Coast mountains and in this protected position it rarely receives moisture from the Pacific or Atlantic Oceans. The desert’s Valle de la Lune resembles another world with crusted salt lakes and windswept stone and sand formations.</p><p>{\"image\":{\"pid\":\"p028l0rv\"}}</p><p>The Andes is the longest continental mountain range in the world, a result of the compressed western edge of the South American Plate. Known as the spine of South America, it acts as a barrier to all but birdlife, meaning that much of the flora and fauna in Chile is unique to the country – unable to travel across the high terrain.</p><p>As you head south the green lowlands, enriched by fertile volcanic ash and meltwater, are home to the llama-like guanacos and the world’s smallest deer, pudu. Glaciers cut through the mountains here as ice flows from the Southern Patagonian Ice Field. The largest of these, the 40-mile long Bruggen Glacier terminates at Torres del Paine National Park.</p><p>The final, southern frontier where the ice-ravaged mountains break up into the Southern Ocean is known as Cape Horn. The moniker still cools the blood of sailors with its chilling reputation for heavy seas, strong winds and icebergs. From north to south, Chile is a true land of fire and ice.</p>","BusinessUnit":"public service","CalloutBody":"","CalloutPosition":"","CalloutSubtitle":"","CalloutTitle":"","Campaign":null,"Collection":null,"DisableAdverts":true,"DisplayDate":"2014-10-13T10:37:29Z","Geolocation":null,"HeadlineLong":"Chile: land of fire and ice","HeadlineShort":"Chile: land of fire and ice","HideRelated":false,"Horizontal":null,"Intro":"On a map Chile resembles a long, thin thermometer and its name evokes both sweltering heat and shivering cold among English speakers. 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class="icon gelicon--mail"></span> </span> <span class="share-item-text">Share by Email</span> </a> </div> </li></ul> </div> </div>   <div class="mid-unit"> </div>   <div class="bottom-unit"> <div class="byline"> <span class="byline-heading"></span> <div class="source-attribution-wrapper"> <div class="source-attribution-detail"> <ul class="seperated-list source-attribution"> <li class="seperated-list-item source-attribution-author"><span class="index-body">By Michelle Douglass</span></li> </ul> <span class="publication-date index-body">18 August 2017</span> </div> </div> </div> <div class="body-content"> <p>Moonlight triggers the world’s biggest orgy, strange creatures emerge from the depths, and waves glow blue. Some phenomena in the ocean can only be witnessed after dark.</p><p><strong>1. Bioluminescence makes the sea shimmer</strong></p><p><div class="inline-media inline-image"> <a data-replace-url="" data-anchor-title="Dinoflagellates emit blue light when they’re disturbed" data-caption="Dinoflagellates emit blue light when they’re disturbed, like at this bay on Vaadhoo Island in the Maldives (Credit: Naturepl.com/Doug Perrine)" data-caption-title="" data-replace-image="true" data-is-portrait="false" class="replace-image" title="Dinoflagellates emit blue light when they’re disturbed " href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/wm/live/624_351/images/live/p0/5c/q9/p05cq9pg.jpg"> View image of Dinoflagellates emit blue light when they’re disturbed </a></div></p><p>You may have seen the pictures.</p><p>It’s night-time in an impossibly exotic location. Waves are breaking on the beach. The water is sparkling with electric blue lights. </p><p>The internet loves an image of a magical-looking bioluminescent bay. You may also have seen travel bloggers bemoaning the real event as not quite living up the hype.</p><p>Even if the latter is true, bioluminescence (in this case usually caused by planktonic organisms called dinoflagellates) is a pretty amazing natural phenomenon.</p><p>Dinoflagellates emit blue light when disturbed, which is why they can be seen sparkling over wave crests, around boats or when a hand or paddle runs through them.</p><p>These tiny creatures are the most common source of bioluminescence at the ocean’s surface.</p><p>So-called bioluminescent bays such as in Puerto Rico and Jamaica are among the best-known places to witness the glow. However, the ephemeral phenomenon can be found throughout the ocean where there are dense gatherings of dinoflagellates.</p><p>Sometimes dinoflagellates’ population increases rapidly causing blooms, which by day are coloured a less attractive red-brown, sometimes known as red tides. And some, but not all, of these red tides are poisonous. </p><p><div class="inline-media inline-image"> <a data-replace-url="" data-anchor-title="These creatures provide the most common source of bioluminescence at the ocean’s surface" data-caption="These tiny creatures provide the most common source of bioluminescence at the ocean’s surface (Credit: Naturepl.com/Martin Dohrn)" data-caption-title="" data-replace-image="true" data-is-portrait="false" class="replace-image" title="These creatures provide the most common source of bioluminescence at the ocean’s surface " href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/wm/live/624_351/images/live/p0/5c/py/p05cpysq.jpg"> View image of These creatures provide the most common source of bioluminescence at the ocean’s surface </a></div></p><p>Even stranger and rarer than bioluminescent bays are “milky seas”, where continually glowing water stretches for as far as the eye can see.</p><p>Milky seas have only been seen a few hundred times since 1915, mainly concentrated around north-western Indian Ocean and near Java, Indonesia.</p><p>They are not caused by dinoflagellates, but are thought to be the result of “bioluminescent bacteria that have accumulated in large numbers near the surface”, explains to Dr Matt Davis, Assistant Professor of Biology, St. Cloud State University in the US, who specialises in bioluminescence.</p><p>Reports by sailors over the centuries have described milky seas as a nocturnal whitish glow like a field of snow, but scientists have had little chance to investigate the phenomenon first-hand.</p><p>In 2005, researchers analysing archived satellite images <a title="PNAS article: Detection of a bioluminescent milky sea from space" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://www.pnas.org/content/102/40/14181.full">found that milky seas could be seen from space</a> and that one satellite had captured images of a huge area of ocean that had displayed the strange glow for three consecutive nights a decade earlier. </p><p><strong>2. Animals glow in the dark</strong></p><p><div class="inline-media inline-image"> <a data-replace-url="" data-anchor-title="Bobtail squid have a symbiotic relationship with bioluminescent bacteria" data-caption="Bobtail squid have a symbiotic relationship with bioluminescent bacteria (Credit: Naturepl.com/Jurgen Freund)" data-caption-title="" data-replace-image="true" data-is-portrait="false" class="replace-image" title="Bobtail squid have a symbiotic relationship with bioluminescent bacteria " href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/wm/live/624_351/images/live/p0/5c/qb/p05cqb74.jpg"> View image of Bobtail squid have a symbiotic relationship with bioluminescent bacteria </a></div></p><p>Bioluminescence, the emission of visible light by an organism as the result of a natural chemical reaction, is common among marine life such as fishes, squid and molluscs. In the deep sea most species are bioluminescent, where it is the main source of light.</p><p>In shallower waters, most bioluminescent fish display their lights at night.</p><p>“Flashlight fishes have a specialized pouch under their eye that they can rotate to expose the light emitted from these bacteria, and they use this glow at night to hunt for food and communicate,” says Dr Matt Davis.</p><p><div class="inline-media inline-image"> <a data-replace-url="" data-anchor-title="Flashlight fishes have a pouch under their eye used to expose bioluminescent bacteria" data-caption="Flashlight fishes have a specialised pouch under their eye that use to expose bioluminescent bacteria (Credit: Matt Davis)" data-caption-title="" data-replace-image="true" data-is-portrait="false" class="replace-image" title="Flashlight fishes have a pouch under their eye used to expose bioluminescent bacteria " href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/wm/live/624_351/images/live/p0/5c/qd/p05cqds2.jpg"> View image of Flashlight fishes have a pouch under their eye used to expose bioluminescent bacteria </a></div></p><p>Ponyfish emit light from the bioluminescent bacteria housed in a pouch using transparent muscular shutters, to communicate, he explains.</p><p>Camouflage, defence and predation are among the variety of reasons fishes are thought to emit light. </p><p>For example, bobtail squid have an ingenious way of using lights. These nocturnal animals have a mutually beneficial relationship with luminescing bacteria that live in a mantel cavity on its underside. <a title="Full study: Counterillumination in the Hawaiian bobtail squid, Euprymna scolopes Berry (Mollusca: Cephalopoda)" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00227-003-1285-3">At night the squid control the intensity of this light to match the moonlight</a>, and can reduce their silhouette to camouflage themselves from predators.</p><p><strong>3. Moonlight triggers the planet’s biggest orgy</strong></p><p><div class="inline-media inline-image"> <a data-replace-url="" data-anchor-title="The biggest orgy on earth is triggered by moonlight [Credit: Naturepl.com/Jurgen Freund]" data-caption="Mass spawning on the Great Barrier Reef is one of the extraordinary examples of synchronised behaviour on Earth (Credit: Naturepl.com/Jurgen Freund)" data-caption-title="" data-replace-image="true" data-is-portrait="false" class="replace-image" title="The biggest orgy on earth is triggered by moonlight [Credit: Naturepl.com/Jurgen Freund]" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/wm/live/624_351/images/live/p0/5c/qb/p05cqbp7.jpg"> View image of The biggest orgy on earth is triggered by moonlight [Credit: Naturepl.com/Jurgen Freund] </a></div></p><p>There is nothing more romantic than a moonlit night, especially if you are a coral on the Great Barrier Reef off Australia.</p><p>One night a year in spring, the biggest orgy on earth is triggered by lunar light.</p><p>Over 130 coral species simultaneously release their eggs and sperm into the water during a window of just 30-60 minutes.</p><p>This mass spawning event might be the most extraordinary example of synchronised behaviour in the natural world.</p><p>When the gametes – eggs and sperm cells - are released they hover for a moment, forming a ghostly replica of the reef’s shape, before dispersing into an underwater blizzard as the sperm fertilise the eggs.</p><p>Dr Oren Levy, a marine biologist and ecologist and Professor of Life Sciences at Bar-Ilan University, Israel, has studied this extraordinary event.</p><p>“This is really fascinating phenomena…we know this event is going to happen a few nights after November's full moon each year, three to five [days] post full moon,” he says.</p><p>“[It is] always amazing, in particular I am so amazed how each of the coral species year after year spawn at the same hour of the night.”</p><p>He adds: ”Once it happens it is always so exciting to see how everything is becoming so live and synchronised. It is almost [a] spiritual event and you understand the power of nature in its best.”</p><p>Moonlight triggers the phenomenon by acting as a synchroniser or “alarm” probably with other environmental signals such as sunset timings, water temperature and tides to cue the time of the gamete [egg and sperm cells] release, explains Dr Levy.</p><p>He adds that corals seem to possess photoreceptors that detect the phases of the moon, which helps with the “fine tuning” of the gamete release.</p><p><strong>4. Sharks and seals rely on celestial light</strong></p><p><div class="inline-media inline-image"> <a data-replace-url="" data-anchor-title="A great white shark hunting at night" data-caption="Just when you think it's safe to go into the water... great white sharks hunt at night too (Credit: Naturepl.com/Chris & Monique Fallows)" data-caption-title="" data-replace-image="true" data-is-portrait="false" class="replace-image" title="A great white shark hunting at night " href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/wm/live/624_351/images/live/p0/5c/qc/p05cqccw.jpg"> View image of A great white shark hunting at night </a></div></p><p>For some seals, moonlit nights spell danger.</p><p>During winter months, the 60,000 cape fur seals on Sea Island in False Bay, South Africa run the gauntlet of being picked off by great white sharks patrolling the seas when they enter and exit the water.</p><p><a title="Effects of lunar phase on predator-prey interactions between white shark (Carcharodon carcharias) and Cape fur seals (Arctocephalus pusillus pusillus)" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10641-016-0515-8" target="_self">One study in 2016 </a>hypothesised seals swimming at night during a full moon are at more risk of being eaten by a shark since bright moonlight silhouetting them against the surface makes them an easy meal for predators lurking below.</p><p>However, most shark attacks on seals happen just after sunrise. Researchers behind the study, which measured shark attacks at dawn, were surprised to find seals were much less likely to be predated at this time of day if there was a full moon. </p><p>The researchers theorised that lunar illumination combined with emerging sunlight may decrease the stealth ability of the sharks and that the advantage switched from sharks to seals as night turned to day.</p><p>And seals may rely on another celestial feature to navigate - the stars.</p><p><a title="BBC News: Hungry seals 'steer by the stars'" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7532867.stm" target="_self">Captive harbour seals (Phoca vitulina) are able to locate a single lodestar and steer by it</a>, researchers have shown.</p><p>During a test using a simulated night sky, seals swam towards the brightest star and could orientate themselves when the stars were swivelled around.</p><p>In the wild, seals need to navigate the open ocean to find foraging grounds that may be separated by hundreds of kilometres.</p><p>Researcher <a title="BBC News story: Hungry seals 'steer by the stars'" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7532867.stm" target="_self">Dr Bjorn Mauck said at the time</a>: "Seals might learn the position of the stars relative to foraging grounds during dawn and dusk when they can see both the stars and landmarks at the coast."</p><p><strong>5. Strange animals come to the surface every night</strong></p><p><div class="inline-media inline-image"> <a data-replace-url="" data-anchor-title="Humboldt squid are among the most striking creatures to surface every night" data-caption="Humboldt squid are among the most striking creatures to surface every night (Credit: Naturepl.com/Franco Banfi)" data-caption-title="" data-replace-image="true" data-is-portrait="false" class="replace-image" title="Humboldt squid are among the most striking creatures to surface every night " href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/wwfeatures/wm/live/624_351/images/live/p0/5c/qd/p05cqd4r.jpg"> View image of Humboldt squid are among the most striking creatures to surface every night </a></div></p><p>Under the cover of darkness rarely seen creatures migrate to the ocean’s surface to feed.</p><p>The Humboldt squid, also known as the jumbo squid, is one of the most eye-catching marine animals you can see lurking in surface waters.<br/>By day the squid lurk in the deep waters of the Eastern Pacific Ocean along the deep shelf that runs off the west coast of the Americas and every night they are one of the many ocean animals to migrate upwards to find dinner.</p><p>Vertical (or diel) migration - when ocean animals swim to the surface at dusk and disappear down again at dawn – is extremely common.</p><p>“What [Humbioldt squid are] doing largely is following their main food item, which is the so-called lantern fish,” explains Professor Paul Rodhouse, an Emeritus Fellow for the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) and former head of the organisation’s biological sciences division.</p><p>In turn, lantern fish follow vertically migrating zooplankton.</p><p>Since zooplankton are depended on by so many ocean animals, “the rest of the food chain will be following on after it,” says Prof Rodhouse.</p><p>“It is a huge movement of biomass every day,” says Prof Rodhouse. “More than a thousand metres. Some of the oceanic squid probably migrate over 1000m every day.”</p><p>He adds that almost all pelagic species (animals that live in the water column not near the bottom or shore) that can swim make the journey.</p><p>Humboldt squid are among the most striking creatures to surface every night. Their ability to change colour and flash bright red when agitated has earned them the nickname “red devils”. Although much smaller than their cousin, the 13m-giant squid, they can reach a length of about 1.5m (almost 5ft). Highly aggressive predators, they capture prey with strong tentacles and suckers and tear into it with powerful beaks, and have reportedly occasionally attacked humans.</p><p>But even ferocious Humboldts are preyed upon by bigger predators such as billfish, swordfish and sharks.</p><p>“Of course what they are all doing [by being active at night] is avoiding predation by the top predators,” says Prof Rodhouse. "The big predators that are visual predators and which stay in the surface waters and see their prey.”</p><p>“So they’re all… reducing the risk of being preyed on by going down into deep, dark waters at night.”</p><p><em>For more incredible ocean stories, follow <a title="Our Blue Planet on Twitter" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/https://twitter.com/OurBluePlanet">OurBluePlanet</a> on Twitter. Get in touch with to share your most magical ocean moments, and for inspiration <a title="Our Blue Planet Youtube video" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryM_spHroC0">watch the launch video on the BBC Earth YouTube Channel</a>.</em></p><p><em>#OurBluePlanet is a collaboration between <a title="BBC Earth" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/http://www.bbc.com/earth/uk" target="_self">BBC Earth</a> and <a title="Alucia Productions" href="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320/https://aluciaproductions.com/" target="_self">Alucia Productions</a>.</em></p><p><em>Join the #EarthCapture underwater film and photo challenge by uploading your shots here:</em></p><p><em><iframe src="https://web.archive.org/web/20171228112320if_/http://bbcearth.uploader.seenit.io/?projectid=underwater" width="98%" height="650px" scrolling="no"></iframe></em></p><p><em>Never miss a moment. 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