A Bucketful of Oceanic Science Mysteries

SuperJames_74 writes: "Over here they've got a one-page article about some quirky little oceanic scientific mysteries. Those peanut-sized Australian jellyfish sound pretty scary, if you ask me!"

Sharks head for Hawaii

[Muad'Dave]

Pyle was shocked to find the sharks heading due west instead, eventually ending up in Hawaii, 2,500 miles away.

Maybe sharks like to surf the big waves, too.

Re:Sharks head for Hawaii

[Lars T.]

"How about some Polynesian food?" Sorry for the bad pun ;-)

More shark tagging

[southisup]

Neale [csiro.au], who travelled 2946 km with his position being plotted online, and also Heather [csiro.au].
While I'm here, a related tangent: FLIP [ucsd.edu]

Don't touch the snail,

[zulux]

The jellyfish reminds me of a hidden danger of the tropical seas: little colorfull snails, that after you pick up will inject you with a combination of 'tooth' and venom - possibly enough to kill you. These little buggers are responsible for quite a few injuries and an occasional death or two. Woth knowing about the next time you go snorkeling. More info [aqua.org]

Re:Don't touch the snail,

[JabberWokky]

after you pick up will...

Having spent many years snorkeling and scuba diving in subtropical and tropical waters, I can easily tell you - don't touch. Even if it isn't gonna cause you a serious health concern, it's likely to gash, poision, bite or just irritate your flesh. For those who think you can't alter your fingerprints, I have a nifty little design in my left pointer finger where a barracuda zipped in, split my finger lengthwise, hovered for a moment, and then zipped away. And that was *without* me poking, touching or feeding anything.

--
Evan "Frozen peas are fun - until you notice the bigger fish attracted by the small ones"

Re:Don't touch the snail,

[zulux]

It like your sig :)

I remember a rather terrifying expeience of taking a bag of bread* down below the water - the local fish population had grown quite fond of the sight and swarmed me en mass. Litterally, I was the center of a great mound of frantically pecking fish. I was only ten feet below at the time, so I surfaced and held the well gnawed bag of bread above the surface and instantly the hidiould little buggers lost interest.

Sorry to hear about your hand! A least you can brag that it was a barracuda - I have a three inch long gash on by leg from a baby Picasso triggerfish. I noticed him on a outcropping of coral and wathed his antics for a few moments, as I swam away, somthing did somthing to my leg (I assume it was my colorfull fried) and I wound up with a three inch long scar. The little bugger was only two inches long. Oh well, a small price to pay to be a guest in their ocean.

* I later found out (in defence, I was 11 at the time, but should have known better) - don't feed fish bread as it can clog some fishes guts, leading to painfull bloating and death. Don't listen to the natives if they tell you it's ok.

Which way is west?

[capt.Hij]

Why did the sharks make the trip? Reproduction isn't a likely motive: pregnant females have been seen only in the far western Pacific (scientists now suspect these may be the sharks' only spawning grounds)

Uhmm... If you are a Great White (or even a mediocre White) and you live in California and want to look for some action, wouldn't you have to head west? Since Hawaii is west of California and at least offers the possibility of a snack on the way, why not stop by? Then again, maybe they are just attracted to surf boards?

Water bears ROCK!!!!!

[jsimon12]

These guys [microscopy-uk.org.uk] can be frozen in liquid nitrogen, exsposed to deadly radiation, acid, base, whatever, these guys are indestructable. I am glad they are non-pathnogenic.

Re:Water bears ROCK!!!!!

[Tardigrade]

Why thank you! They truly do rock; thanks for the link. It's been way too long since I've read about my namesake.

The Ocean

[Vought 28]

First, we know more about the surface of the moon that we do about the bottom surface of the ocean. That's too bad since we are becoming increasingly dependent on the ocean to feed much of the world. Kelp farms and Plankton fields will soon increase our harvest even more. On the drawing board already are aqua harvesters to trawl the oceans and reap the dividends of the oceanic agriculture. I'm not talking about fishing ships either, but rather a solar powered kelp combine. And, as Authur C. Clark said, we need to corral whales in the way we currently do to sheep and cows. He wrote a short story about it.

Re:The Ocean

[Adrenochrome]

Don't hold your breath. The (insert environmental wacko group here) would have a field day with a kelp farm proposal, let alone whale farming. Hell, we can't even get fish farms approved here in the Gulf of Maine. Ruins the view...