Exploring the Sea
Exploring the Sea
The total surface of the globe is seven tenths water and only three tenths land. Actually a considerable area of the land lies in shallow water and shelves towards the deep ocean bed. The part of the land which is under the water is called the Continental Shelf. This border is probably the part of the former land surface which the sea has since covered. Round the continents, the land shelves gradually to a depth of about six hundred feet. This is the area of the continental shelf and from its edge is a steeper slope to the sea floor. Beneath the sea floor and the land lies a deep layer of basalt.
Some fish are: sun fish, blue shark, pilot fish, flying fish, dolphin, herrings, octopus, garfish, john dory, cuckoo wrasse, red bandfish, sea horses, green moray eel, turbot, cod, garfish, red gunnard, oar fish, coffer fish, squid, tope, porcupine fish, dog fish, saw fish, file fish, and tiger shark.
Considerable research has taken place into conditions far below the surface of the sea - a region without light, warmth or oxygen. Below two hundred feet there is practically no light and at a depthe of half a mile there is complete blackness. In the ocean depths the pressure of the water above is tremendous and the temapreature is almost at freezing point. The hunters of the deep seas live in the dark region. At a deep level the only light comes from the sea creatures themselves. The gleam attracts animals on which they prey for food. There is an abundance of marine life down to about twelve hundred feet but it diminishes below this depth. No vegetation lives in the darkness. For Adventure nuts like you get into a bathysphere. In this steel globe with thick quartz windows to withstand the enormous pressure, Dr William Beebe descended to three thousand feet off Bermuda.
Some of the marine life are creatures of the Atlantic, European and Mediterranean coasts. They include tunny, moorish idol, blue parrot fish, siphonophore, gonostoma polyphos, jelly fish, astonesthes, eater of stars, cuttle fish, photostomias guernei, three starred angler fish, lantern fish, indiacanthus niger, orange lighted finger squid, silver hatchet fish, and bathyspara intacta.