This post is about the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Here is the link to the PREZI slideshow I did on it:
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Also known as Eurypharynx Pelecanoides, Pelican Eel, or Umbrella Mouth Gulper, these are one of the strangest looking species of animal on earth. When I first heard about Gulper Eels, I thought “That’s an eel that’s all mouth and no body!” They can range in length from 3 to 6 feet, and live at an approximate depth of 5OO to 6OOO feet below the surface of the ocean. They’re usually black or brown and have a glowing light called a photophore on the end of their tails.
From now on, I will post about a new plant, animal, or fungi every day.* Today, I am doing the Blue Ringed Octupus. Hence its name, it has blue rings all over it. Its main color can range from yellow to greenish blue. Here is a picture:
it is poisonous in the extreme. It has tetrodotoxin as its most harmful component, which will paralyze us and can cause respiratory failure. The fact that this usually happens 6O feet below the surface doesn’t help either!
So far, there are four known species of Blue Ringed Octopus: The Greater Blue-ringed Octopus, Southern Blue-ringed Octopus, and Blue-lined Octopus. Although they look very large they usually only grow to be the size of a golf ball. However, there may be more out there since they are so hard to study.
*Except on most weekends.
However, not all that we do to the ocean is bad. Right now there are an estimated 230,000 animal species living in the ocean, but there is thought to be at least one million more! It is thought that only 3 percent of the world’s oceans (including surface area) have been explored! And since the world’s oceans cover 3/4ths of earth, that means that there is still 7 .2 percent of the earth left to explore*! and with that, comes an estimated 2,139,000 more creature to find! And, some of these could prove to be very useful in modern medicine, or we might be inspired by nature to actually think about what we’re doing for a second, and realize that if we are to continue to survive, we are going to have to make a few sacrifices for the sake of the Earth! And I know that it probably sounds hypocritical, but giving up every day use computers may have to be one of those sacrifices! -This is not worth the loss of thousands of species and millions of creatures, just so that we can drive four blocks to the school**! So we should just think about what we are doing and make all the changes we can.
*This estimate assumes that all the dry ground surface of Earth has been explored.
**This is something I saw on my way to school. (and I WAS WALKING , just so you know!)
There are many types of endangered species in the worlds oceans other than plankton. Although some *of these are caused by the natural process of the Earth killing off obselete species to make room for new ones, most are caused by us. Many species have become endangered because we thought that the ocean would not run out of recources for a long, long, time. however, many of the species of fish that we often eat are getting to have smaller and smaller populations. And sincwe there is so much that we don’t know about the oceans, it is important to conserve them until we have enough time and the required technology to learn all we can about them. Because even if we don’t know that they exist, they are still out there and they could be more importand to sustainable life on earth than we could ever imagine. For more information, go to this site. http://www.noaa.gov/ocean.html
*By “some”, I mean almost none.
I think that it is very important to be educated on the world’s oceans. If there where no oceans, humans would have almost no oxygen. Most people think that most of the earth`s oxygen comes from trees, but most of the earth’s air actually comes from plankton . Plankton usually are single celled plant and animals.They are eaten by most large sea creatures, like Blue Whales and Whalesharks, as well as many others. This makes them exremely important to many ecosystems, including ours. Unfortunetly, there are now many spaces of ocean that are called dead zones. these are low oxygen areas that can support almost no life. These are caused by chemicals that have been dumped into the oceans. When there is no oxygen in the water the plankton can’t breathe, so they die. this causes the marine animals that are in that area or dependent on the plankton to die too. Here is an image of the effects: 
