#neuston creatures

[littledoughty]

This is a buoy barnacle, a free floating barnacle drifting on ocean currents eating whatever it can get its little tentacles on. Open ocean creatures are susceptible to any surface trawling, something ocean cleanups don't always take into consideration.

[tokay-blog]

4- Neustonic

It's a bit of a shame that there are no amphibious creatures in the game at all, except as cut content

Nevertheless, when the reefbacks emerge, the organisms living on their backs become vulnerable, something predators would have successfully exploited.

[shades4dogs]

excuse the random ask but i feel like you would like to see this thread about marine life being found in the pacific garbage patch- there is an entire ecosystem established in the boundary!

wow, this is really fascinating, thank you for the link!

for anyone interested, it details the discovery of an entire ecosystem abundant in neuston in the pacific garbage patch, a really understudied form of ecosystem that has existed for millions of years.

it forms on the floating islands of plastic as the species present travel through water in the same way plastic does, with buoyancy and catching currents. examples of species found include blue sea dragons, several species of jelly (sailor and blue button), and violet snails :-)

this thriving ecosystem is capitalised on by a variety of predators, leading to an increased risk of these creatures ingesting litter:

it emphasises that this means the best approach to tackling litter in our oceans is not to remove it but instead to stop it from being introduced in the first place, cut it off at the source. focussing on removal of litter from the sea can prevent what the thread describes as "bulldozing a meadow", especially as the life present in the five major garbage patches is so understudied!!!

this is so sick thank you for sharing it with me :-D

[frustrationinexcelsis]

That krill are still "plankton" because plankton refers to whatever animals, algae and other organisms are carried around by the sea's currents, not to any particular group of life or a size category

On that note, "plankton" is actually one of four major divisions of aquatic life defined based on how they move or don't move in the water. The other four are neuston (creatures that float on the surface of the water), nekton (active swimmers that can move independently of the water's currents) and benthos (creatures that live on the bottom and don't swim).

Also, that means a few additional things:

Some creatures move between these categories as they age -- most crustaceans are part of the plankton as larvae and part of the benthos as adults, as are echinoderms like starfish and sea urchins. Most fish have planktonic larvae as well, but become nekton as they age.

Freshwater has plankton (and neuston, nekton, and bethos) the same as the sea does. Here's a bloom of planktonic algae in Lake Erie!

Jellyfish and sargassum are also plankton.

Simple lifeform facts I take for granted that I've now seen blowing people's minds on here:

That sea urchins walk around and have mouths with teeth on their undersides

That corals are related to jellyfish

Barnacles being related to crabs and shrimp

Ants being an offshoot of wasps

Termites being totally unrelated to ants and all similarities just being convergent evolution (they're actually a group of cockroaches, but even science didn't know that part until a few years ago)

Starfish having an eye at the end of each arm

That the bodies of ticks and mites are also their heads, essentially big heads with legs (they even frequently have eyes way up on "the body")

Sperm whales have no upper teeth, and also their bodies are flat from the front

Goats also having no upper (front) teeth

Tapeworms having no mouth at all and just absorbing nutrients over their entire body surface

That flies are bigger pollinators than bees

That moths are bigger pollinators than bees

That wasps are just as important pollinators as bees (more important to many groups of plants) and when we say they're "less efficient" at it we just mean individually they get a little less pollen stuck to them.

That honeybees are nonnative to most of the world and not good for the local ecosystem, just good for human agriculture

That earthworms are also nonnative and destructive to more habitats than the reverse

There being no hard biological line between slugs and snails; all slugs aren't necessarily related to each other and there are gastropod groups where some have shells and some don't

That ALL octopuses (not just the blue ring) have a venomous bite

Most jellyfish and sea anemones being predators that eat fish

"Krill" being shrimp up to a few inches long and not some kind of microbe

Blue whales therefore being the deadliest predators to ever evolve as they eat up to several million individual animals per day

That krill are still "plankton" because plankton refers to whatever animals, algae and other organisms are carried around by the sea's currents, not to any particular group of life or a size category

Fungi being no more related to plants than we are, and in fact more like a sibling to the animal kingdom if anything

Venus fly traps being native to only one small area of North America in all the world

Parasites being essential to all ecosystems

Leeches not having a circular ring of teeth anywhere

That algae is not a type of plant

That most seaweed is just very big algae

That enough wood ends up in the ocean that plenty of sea life evolved to eat only wood

Speaking of which the fact that the "ship worms" that make tunnels in wood are just long noodly clams

Butterflies technically just being a small weird group of moths we gave a different name to

That insects only get wings once they reach maximum size and therefore there can never be a younger smaller bee or fly that's not a larva

Spiders not being any more likely to kill their own mates/young than just a cat or dog might, for most species maybe a lot less often?

[ms-hells-bells]

i now regret giving money to team seas. they do not really have a proper way of removing garbage without killing marine and freshwater life that floats just under/on the surface of water, called neustons. most fish eggs are neustons, some seahorses and sea slugs are neustons, zooplankton are neustons, many jellies are neustons, so much vital life are neustons for at least part of their lives.

and the responses from this guy and his team to (INDEPENDENT) biologists and ecologists expressing concern is dismissal, and a "bottomless net, so they can swim out". THIS CREATURES CAN'T SWIM, THEY FLOAT ALONG THE OCEAN CURRENTS, AND SO END UP IN THE SAME AREAS AS GARBAGE PATCHES.

TOC literally said "survival of the fittest lol"

this isn't to safe marine life, this is the narcissistic ego project of a group of men that rely on the general public not knowing how ecosystems work, and not knowing about neustons.

the easiest, cheapest, and most effective way to stop the ocean being full of plastic is to prevent plastic getting in in the first place. netting and filtering systems for rivers, streams, beach coasts, drainage, and other sources where the plastic travels to get into the ocean in the first place. and most of all, THE STOPPING OF COMMERCIAL FISHING, WHICH IS RESPONSIBLE FOR 60% OF THE GREAT PACIFIC GARBAGE PATCH ALONE.

[breezyseas-explorersblog]

Rub-a-Dub-Dub Tons of Seabirds in the Tub!

Starting with midnight ships time (since that’s when at least one watch starts their day), we had a very successful bat at science! It never ceases to amaze me how alive the ocean surface is when half the world is sleeping. Our Mid Watch science deployment typically consists of a Neuston tow and a surface station, collecting mysterious sea creatures that come up to feed at the surface waters at night. Tonight we caught pipefish (see picture), flat fish larva, an ideal ctenophore specimen, a baby squid, as well as more jellyfish! We also caught a plentiful amount of zooplankton and other nekton. The organisms that we catch and study contribute to our biodiversity data, as well as multiple student projects that correlate species to bodies of water, determine the ocean’s health, and learn more about organism’s distribution.

Now getting to the four seasons of weather we experienced today. As the sun’s rays rose, reaching the ship, some of our shipmates woke up to a beautiful summer morning with calm glassy water. We were surrounded by tons of seabirds consisting of albatross, petrels, and gulls, all swimming around the ship happy as can be. It was warm enough to walk up on deck barefoot in a t-shirt. A few hours later, the winds started to pick up and summer quickly turned into spring as the rain began to fall. The rain didn’t last too long as it changed to snow for a while, just to remind us that it is winter back in the Northern Hemisphere. As the day came to an end, we entered fall, with the clouds starting to part and a cool wind at our backs. The sun painted a beautiful sunset before saying good night. Just another typical day out sailing in the South Pacific!

Oh yeah, we had a Nautical Science practical exam today, too. As much fun it is to live, work and do research aboard a beautiful tall ship, we occasionally have reminders that we are, in fact, still in school. The test consisted of us going thru the ship answering questions to demonstrate our knowledge on line handling, ships safety, proper log keeping, and navigation. With each seafaring day we get a little bit saltier, transitioning from students into mariners.

Thank you to everyone that has been following our journey, and sending love to my Mom, Dad, my fur balls and family and friends. I miss you all and wish you a wonderful holiday season and am looking forward to seeing everyone when I return in the New Year!

Best Wishes, Breezy

[littledoughty]

The argonaut octopus is pelagic, and unusual in that it lives close to the ocean’s surface and that the females secrete a paper thin protective shell, which is unique to the genus.

[littledoughty]

Anchovies are an abundant filter feeding fish, their larva have been found in marine neustons and are abundant source of food for many predatory marine animals. And also people.

[littledoughty]

The Portuguese man o' war, probably the most well known member of the neuston, and also a siphonophore, a colonial organism made up of zooids.

[littledoughty]

Floating anemone are rarely seen, but they hang out in the neuston with a bubble float on their pedal disc.

[littledoughty]

Porpita porpita, aka blue button, another colonial hydroid living in the neuston, floating around eating copepods and crustacean larvae, living the dream.

[littledoughty]

Happy inktober! This is velella velella or by-the-wind-sailor, from the neuston aka open ocean surface environment. Water column and open ocean creatures are close to my heart and they're all I'm going to draw this month.