Over at Deep Sea News they've been composing bucket lists of marine species (here and here). So, today I thought I would compose a top five list of my favourite marine species.
1. Glaucus atlanticus
It steals the stinging cells from its cnidarian prey and uses them for its own protection. Amazing!
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| The beautiful and amazing Glaucus atlanticus (photo Wikipedia). |
The biggest invertebrate known by weight. The giant squid, Architeuthis dux, may grow to be longer, but only because of its long feeding arms. Without the arms, the colossal squid is longer.
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| At 495 kg, this is the biggest colossal squid that has been caught. We know from beaks recovered from the stomachs of sperm whales that there are much bigger ones out there (photo Wikipedia) |
There are a large number of flying fish in the family Exocoetidae, I like them all. I chose C. pinnatibarbatus because it is found off the Australian coast.
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| The Atlantic flying fish Cheilopogon malanurus, which looks similar to C. pinnatibarbatus (photo Wikipedia) |
What they lack in size, they more than make up for in number. With an estimated biomass of 500 million tonnes, they are probably have a greater total mass than any other species.
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| Euphausia superba (photo Wikipedia) |
The biggest animal to have ever lived. What other reason do you need?
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| Balaenoptera musculus, the biggest animal ever (photo Wikipedia) |
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