Deep Sea Weirdos
Where the real action happens.
If there’s a heaven for me,
I’m sure it has a beach
attached to it.
–Jimmy Buffett
Earth Day was earlier this week, and this year’s theme is not Green Cities or Trees for Earth or something else delightful to ponder. No, the disheartening phrase for 2024 is Planet vs. Plastics.
More disheartenting still, this is not the first year that plastics have starred in the show. Back in 2018, Plastic Pollution was the cause célèbre, although lest you accuse the Earth Day folks of laziness in topic selection, the focus this year is on microplastics, which are even more depressing than plastics in general. (See Marina Schauffler’s excellent, well-researched SubStack newsletter ContamiNation, which “provides insights, research updates and news highlights to help illuminate the threats posed by per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), and by microplastics and nanoplastics.” Despite its topic, it is a hopeful, interesting letter. Please check it out.)
Thinking about plastics makes me think about sea creatures choked by six-pack rings, and I don’t write this newsletter to get depressed. So, I looked deeper down, all the way to that place stranger than space:
The bottom of the ocean.
Strangeness is so common down there that it’s hard to pick just one entity to talk about, but I’m going with the barreleye fish.
Picture a classic blue VW bug with its top-front quarter scooped out and replaced with a see-through dome. True story, Jack, I’m serious, I’m not kidding around. Sitting where the front seats ought to be are two basketball-sized, clear half-orbs that move around.
But those are not basketballs. They are eyes. (More precisely, they are the lenses of the eyes, which are tubular.) Mostly, the eyes look up, which is the best direction to look if you’re hanging deep in the sea. But they also rotate forward when there’s something worth seeing in that direction. Two black round spots where you’d expect the eyes to be and that look like eyes are actually the barreleye’s version of nostrils.
Weird, huh? But don’t take my word for it, see for yourself:
As noted on Monterey Bay Aquarium’s fantastic site, “Barreleyes live in the ocean’s twilight zone—a depth where the sunlight from the surface fades into darkness. Its ultra-sensitive eyes look up to see the silhouettes of its prey.”
I think these guys are kind of adorable, but they also look a little menacing...until you see them to scale. Check out the handy guide on the above-noted site. Swimming alongside a human, they’re about the size of one of our feet. Just minding their own business...while keeping a not-too-subtle eye on their whereabouts. As John Oliver says, except I’m not saying it ironically: cool.
These fish are also interesting because what we know about them, which isn’t a lot, is fairly recent. Before 1939, no scientists had seen a live specimen, just mangled corpses. We first saw them chillin’ in their natural habitat in the 1990s. We have theories about what they eat and how they do it. (It involves, at least sometimes, swimming among the V-shaped, grasping floating strands of another sea creature that captures prey in those strands and then stealing its catch). But as to their weird body variations, we don’t know why they adapted as they did.
They’re beautiful and relaxing to watch. As the National Marine Sanctuary Foundation notes, their “large, flat pectoral fins help the fish remain suspended and motionless in the water column and to move very carefully and precisely.”
Learn more about the barreleye and see yet more images at the Ocean Conservancy.
These guys are among the 10 favorites selected by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute’s scientists. Say hello to them all here.
Traveling this summer? If you’re in the area, check out the Monterey Bay Aquarium. It is factually the most fantastic institution on the planet, and I know because I have been on every square inch of it.
There’s a bonus if you go—or if, honestly, you don’t really care much about ocean life, but let’s just keep this vacay free of drama, shall we? While the kiddos are inside, you can hang out seaside and admire the spectacular scenery and flying soundtrack.
(I did not get paid to say any of this. I just really, really like this place.)
But say you aren’t into weird deep-sea creatures or the beauty of the Central California Coast? Well, then, head over to Chasing Nature’s ode to Earth Day and admire Bryan Pfeiffer’s Fifty Shades of Red.
Lagniappe: Take the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s “deep-sea personality quiz and unearth your deep-sea aquatic alter ego.” (I’m an isopod.)
Plus: as noted in the Lagniappe of a previous issue, the cicadas have arrived with historic zeal. For you in the east, enjoy the symphony.