The 70% of our World covered in water, holding 80% of all life on earth is still a mystery to many of us. A World so completely different than that we live in on the surface, the underwater world has often been described as an alien planet right here on Earth. So much so, that Writer- Director of the superhit movie ‘Avatar’, James Cameron created the Alien Planet of Pandora with influences and some striking resemblances to marine life and underwater landscapes (Read:James Cameron’s Love for Scuba Diving Shows in Avatar).

Here’s a look at some Frequently Asked Questions about this Wonderfully Wacky World Underwater (including some you may never have thought of before) -

How Do Marine Animals Navigate the Underwater World?
You’ve probably heard of marine animals like whales or turtles migrating thousands-of-miles across open oceans, through ferocious storms and past the shores of many different countries only to return again to the same spot at a later time in the year or in the next. It isn’t as simple as getting onto the ‘Interstate 95 and going straight till you hit an exit at 75′. So how do they do it with no roads, landmarks or gps?

From what we’ve learned, many marine animals use a combination of their senses, including sight and sound which is sometimes known as ‘echoloacation‘. How this works, is they project sounds called sonar clicks, that are reflected back when the sounds strike an object which allows these animals to determine the distance of objects (food, predators) as well as features of the underwater environment (shorelines, seafloor depth, topography) for navigation purposes. While this explains only part of how they can navigate underwater and don’t bump into things, for their migratory travel marine animals use what God gave them- a ’sixth sense’ which acts like a built in compass and allows them to detect and ride the magnetic energy of the Earth.

Turtles,whales, sharks, tuna, salmon, trout, spiny lobsters, sea slugs, birds, in effect, have the equivalent of a GPS system that’s based on magnetism. They respond to specific magnetic fields that exist in different parts of the ocean and use the inclination angle and intensity of the Earth’s magnetic field as guidelines to determine the direction they want to go in. In short marine animals use their biological compass to make global migrations along magnetic highways in the Ocean’s. How they have developed this skill and how it seems to work the way it does, remains one of the big unanswered mysteries of the marine world.

Do fish ever get thirsty?
If fish ever reach the point they get thirsty, I think not. However, Fish living do need to drink a lot to avoid shriveling up like prunes. Water flows in and out of a fish’s body through a process called osmosis .In osmosis, water moves from where there is less dissolved salt to where there is more. Since seawater is saltier than the liquids in a fish’s body, water inside the fish is constantly flowing out and the fish drinks to replace the lost water.

Which Marine Animal is the Top Predator of the Seas?
If you just thought “Oh, that’s easy, it’s the Great White Shark”, you’re wrong! Killer Whales are the only sea animal that outranks the Tiger Shark and Great White Shark as top predator of the seas. Regarded as apex predators, killer whales have no natural predators and prey on some of the other fierce predators of the ocean including sharks and other whales like minke whales, gray whales, sperm whales and blue whales. They have also reported to be drawn to cannibalism, though it’s not common as they hunt and live in groups called pods. With a wide diet ranging from cold-blooded fish to seals, sea-lions, penguins ad so on, however, it’s most startling hunting is not in the ocean but on the beach when they swoop up with a swell onto the beach seizing unsuspecting seals and sea lions.

Can Fish Swim Backwards?
A number can, but usually don’t. Those that can are mostly members of one of the eel families.

FUN FACT: “Floating gold” is another name for Whale vomit, or ambergris, which can fetch between $10 and $20 per gram. Ambergris is used as an ingredient in fine perfume because of its unique odor and ability to make a scent “stick” to the skin.

More Questions:
Do Fish Fart?
How long do fish live? How can you tell the age of a fish?
Do Fish sleep?
What is the World’s Largest Fish? The Smallest?

*Photo Credits: photos by aSIMULAtor, mrmritter on flickr

Here’s a look at some Frequently Asked Questions about this Wonderfully Wacky World Underwater (including some you may never have thought of before) -

Do Fish Fart?
Fish flatulence may not be one of those most common marine mysteries you are dieing to know the answer to, but at the same time it has never failed to create a perplexed look on the recipients face and get everyone thinking…do they?

Well, the answer depends on your definition of a fart. If you consider farting to be the by-product of digestion (gases) expelled solely through the rear-end, then no most fish don’t fart (with the exception of herring and sand sharks). Some may say they’ve observed air escaping from the neither region of a fish after they gulped air at the surface, but this isn’t really a product of digestion, so can it be termed a fart? Most fish do use air to inflate and deflate their bladder to maintain buoyancy which is expelled either through their mouth or gills which can be mistaken for a fart. For example, sand tiger sharks gulp air into their stomachs at the surface which they then discharge out the back door to attain a desired depth. Is that a fart in the true sense of the word? We’ll let you decide. Experts say that the digestive gases of fish are consolidated with their feces and expelled in gelatinous tubes which fish sometimes eat again (eew…I know!). Point being – No farts.

The Herring however, is a whole other story. Research and observation has shown that this fish creates a mysterious underwater noise through their stern (referred to as farting or breaking wind0, which is always accompanied by a fine stream of bubbles. This way of expelling air to create a high-frequency sound is means of communication for the herring and shows no connection to digestive gases or what we call farts except that it looks like bubbles coming out of the anal duct of the fish.

How long do fish live? How can you tell the age of a fish?
Some of the smaller reef fish can have a lifespan of a few weeks or months while some other species like sturgeons can live upto 50 years or more. Longevity information is still sparse, but scientists have learned that a lot of species live approximately 10 to 20 years in temperate waters. Animals with some of the longest lives are the Marion’s tortoise (152 years), the fin whale (116 years) and the deep-sea clam (100 years).

The age of a fish can be determined in two ways. One, by growth “rings” on it’s scales, and the second and more reliable method by the ringlike structures found in otoliths (small bones of the inner ear). The rings correspond to seasonal changes in the environment and can be compared to the annual rings of tree trunks. A series of fine rings are laid down in scales for each year of life in summer, the rings grow faster and have relatively wide separations; in winter, slower growth is indicated by narrow separations between rings. Each pair of rings indicates one year. Because scale rings are sometimes influenced by other factors, scientists often use otoliths, whose ringlike structures also indicate years of life.

Do fish sleep?
It all depends on what you mean by sleep. My dictionary says that sleep is a period of rest in which the eyes are closed and there is little or no thought or movement. That is, sleeping means closing your eyes and resting. The first thing we notice is that most fish don’t have eyelids (except for sharks). Also, while some deep ocean fish never stop moving a great many fishes live nearly motionless lives and many do so on a regular diurnal/nocturnal cycle, some active by day others by night.So we can’t generalize and say that all fish sleep like we do. But most fish do rest. Usually they just blank their minds and do what we might call daydreaming. Some float in place, some wedge themselves into a spot in the mud or the coral, some even build themselves a nest. They will still be alert for danger, but they will also be “sleeping.” Dolphins sleep with one eye open!

What is the world’s largest fish? The smallest?
The largest is the whale shark, which grows to more than 50 feet in length and may weigh several tons; second largest is the basking shark, which may measure 35 to 40 feet long. The smallest fish in the world are the pygmy goby and the Luzon goby, from the Philippines, which are only one-half-inch long when they are full grown..It seldom is longer than a half inch at adulthood, yet is so abundant it supports a fishery.

By considerable measure, the largest known marine mammal and animal on Earth is the blue whale. Mature blue whales can measure anywhere from 75 feet (23 meters) to 100 feet (30.5 meters) from head to tail, and can weigh as much as 150 tons (136 metric tons).

More Questions:
How Do Marine Animals Navigate the Underwater World?
Do fish ever get thirsty?
Which Marine Animal is the Top Predator of the Seas?
Can fish swim backwards?

*Photo Credits: photos by PKMousie, star5112, richard ling on flickr

• The lowest known point on Earth is called the Challenger Deep, it is 36,200 feet deep, in the Marianas Trench in the western Pacific. To get an idea of how deep that is, if you could take Mt. Everest and place it at the bottom of the trench there would still be over a mile of ocean above it.
• Antarctica has as much ice as the Atlantic Ocean has water.

• The Blue whale is the largest animal on our planet ever (exceeding the size of the greatest known dinosaurs) and has a heart the size of a Volkswagen.
• Each year, two times as much rubbish is dumped into the world’s oceans as the weight of fish caught.

• The swordfish and marlin are the fastest fish in the ocean reaching speeds up to 121 kilometers or 75 mph in quick bursts; the blue-fin tuna may reach sustained speeds up to 90 kph or 55 mph.
• Sharks attack some 50-75 people each year worldwide on average, with perhaps 8-12 fatalities on average. On the flip side, we kill somewhere between 20-100 million sharks every year.
• 90% of all volcanic activity occurs in the oceans.

• The speed of sound in water is 4,708 feet per second – nearly five times faster than the speed of sound in air.
• The highest tides in the world are at the Bay of Fundy, which separates New Brunswick from Nova Scotia. At some times of the year the difference between high and low tide is 53.4 feet. That’s about the same as a four-story building.
• Because the architecture and chemistry of coral is so similar to human bone, coral has been used to replace bone grafts in helping human bone to heal quickly and cleanly.

• The pressure at the deepest point in the ocean is more than 11,318 tons/sq m, or the equivalent of one person trying to support 50 jumbo jets.
• One study of a deep-sea community revealed 898 species from more than 100 families and a dozen phyla in an area about half the size of a tennis court. More than half of these were new to science.

*Photo Credits: photos by Guille Avalos, Fabi Fliervoet, bbialek905, Sam and Ian on flickr

References:
Ocean Planet
Mote Marine Laboratory
National Geophysical Data Center (NGDC)

The Ghost pipefish is one of those sea creatures that divers simply love , mainly due to the fact that these tiny creatures are so difficult to spot, blending in so well with their surroundings, that often the only way to see ghost pipefish is to dive with an experienced dive master who knows where they live on the reef. The second reason for these creatures being so popular with divers is that they are simply stunning and unusual creatures to look at, as they hover motionlessly upside down looking like an extension of the coral behind it.

Ghost Pipefish also better known as False Pipefish or Tube mouth Fish, are in fact not members of the Pipefish family, but are closely related to the Pipefish and sea horse family, which is perhaps why the Ghost Pipefish while having the long tube-like snout taking up 1/3 of its size is similar to the pipefish, and its body covered with external plates making its appearance and size more like a seahorse.

They are found in tropical waters of the Indian Ocean primarily and also known to be found in the western pacific up to Japan. Ghost Pipefish are tiny creatures that grow no longer than 6 inches (15cm) and are found in waters ranging from 3-30m (9-98ft) mostly around coral reefs. Ghost Pipefish feed on tiny crustaceans like shrimp, mysids (opossum shrimps) and benthic creatures that live in the substrate or seabed. These creatures are almost vacuumed up into the Ghost Pipefish’s long snout.

Ghost pipefish spend most of their lives with their head/mouth facing downwards, floating near motionlessly around coral or rocks that they blend in with making them nearly impossible to see. These fascinating creatures are also known to change their color to blend in with their backgrounds, and additionally change their shape as well, adding to their mystery and intrigue.

Some of the more well-known types of Ghost Pipefish are the Ornate, Robust and the Rough Ghost Pipefish.

Ornate Ghost Pipefish (Harlequin Ghost Pipefish)
The Ornate Ghost pipefish also known as the Harlequin Ghost Pipefish is probably the most easily identifiable type of Ghost Pipefish, owing to its elaborate form, well developed fins and brighter variable colors and spots or bands make it a prize for underwater photographers and scuba divers. Ornate Ghost Pipefish are normally found close to featherstars, soft coral, sea pens and black coral and grow up to 11cms in length.

Robust Ghost Pipefish
Varies from Green to brown and is known to mimic the appearance of rotting sea grass or sea weed and is very difficult to spot. This species of Ghost Pipefish grows up to 15cms (6 inches) and is found in lagoons and coastal bays and areas containing sea grass.

Rough Ghost Pipefish
The Rough Ghost pipefish grows to 12cms in length and is reddish brown and covered with rough scales that make it look like algae.

Photo Credits: photos by PacificKlaus, Nick Hobgood,Stephen Childs,ray ellersick on flickr

One of the most fascinating places on the reef are fish cleaning stations.  These are locations on the reef where fish and other marine life congregate each morning to be cleaned of parasites, dead skin cells, and bacteria. These cleaning fish and marine animals, are an essential part to maintaining a healthy reef ecosystem.

At night while the fish sleep in cracks and crevices along the reef, tiny parasites known as ectoparasites attach themselves on the fish’s body usually near their fins or gill slits.  Each morning, the fish being unable to remove these parasites visits a cleaning station at some point in the day, where cleaning fish or shrimp, help remove these parasites by eating them off the body of the fish.

In exchange for their services, cleaner fish of the reef are not eaten and have a strange immunity from being predated upon by larger fish.

Cleaning stations are often a particular coral feature, located either on top of a large coral head or in a slot between two outcroppings, and the cleaning fish attracts ‘customers’ to its station by different means.

There are multiple animals that make their living as cleaners in the reef; however the most popular of these are the Cleaner Wrasse, the cleaner Shrimp and gobies.

The Cleaner Wrasse
The Cleaner Wrasse, also known as the Bluestreak Cleaner Wrasse, is found mostly along the reefs of the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean as well as the Red Sea and Southeast Asia.  It is a small fish (5.5 inches) with a slender elongated body separated by a black horizontal band generally bluish or yellow on the upper side and white underneath.  It lives off parasites and dead skin of fish that visit its cleaning station, where it attracts passing fish by doing a peculiar dance inviting the fish in for a cleaning.

Cleaner Shrimp
Cleaner Shrimp also known as the Skunk Cleaner Shrimp or White-banded Shrimp are also fixtures at cleaning stations, found in reefs throughout the Indo-Pacific and Red Sea, which is why they are frequently referred to as the Pacific Cleaner Shrimp. These shrimp advertise their services by waving their long antennae at all passing fish, inviting them to stop for a cleaning.  Fish on sighting the cleaner shrimp will often open their mouths wide allowing the shrimp to enter their mouths and remove parasites, dead skin and bacteria.

Cleaning Goby
Cleaning Goby also known as Neon Goby, look rather similar to the cleaner Wrasse with their dark horizontal stripe, bright colors and small size. Originally inhabitants of the Gulf of Mexico and Belize Reefs, cleaning gobies are bottom dwelling fish that set up cleaning stations to remove ectoparasites usually from larger fish like grouper, snapper and Jacks that line up at its cleaning stations.

Cleaning stations are huge attractions to scuba divers, and humans are no exceptions from the services of these reef cleaning creatures. If a diver approaches a cleaning station with his/her mouth open (regulator out of-course!) cleaner shrimp will not hesitate to enter the diver’s mouth and begin cleaning immediately. This is a fascinating thing to watch, and also very difficult to stay with your mouth open as these tiny shrimp crawl inside tickling and nipping at the insides of your mouth.  Cleaner Wrasse too, are known to swim up to a passing diver and nip at dead skin cells on their hands or feet and portions not covered by the wetsuit.

Photos from flickr by: lazlo-photo, doug.deep, Joachim.S.Muller,  pnendick,Philippe Guillaume,

Of an estimated 1.4 -1.6 million marine species on Earth only 250,000- 300,000 (approximate figure) species are known to man. It comes as no surprise, when just one liter of seawater alone can host 20,000 different microbes.1,000 – 1,500 new marine species are identified each year!

With well over 16,000 marine fish species, these next 5 fish don’t even make a dent in the catalog of fish you probably haven’t even heard of but we thought we’d start somewhere. Here are some pretty Bizarre Fish you won’t forget that easily-

Crocodile Fish

Aptly named for it’s resemblance to a crocodile, this unusual looking flathead species belongs to the flathead family Platycephalidae. This bottom-dwelling ambush hunter, feeds largely on smaller fish and crustaceans and is also known as De Beaufort’s flathead or crocodile flathead. It’s closely related to scorpionfish and stonefish. The crocodilefish is a mottled brown or green and grey color, ideal to camouflaged with their habitat, on a sandy or rubble sea bed. They are native to the western Pacific region including Philippines, Borneo, Papua New Guinea, New Caledonia, Palau, and even Indonesia. They can reach a length of 50 centimeters (20 in) and have very photographic eyes especially for underwater macro photography. Unlike actual crocodiles though, divers who come across a crocodile fish have little to worry about as the fish often remains very still, even if humans approach them.

Ocean Sunfish (Mola Mola)

This strange fish (yes, it is a fish!) that looks more like a gigantic rock or fossil is actually the heaviest known bony fish in the world. The Mola Mola, as the Ocean Sunfish is also known can grow up to 1.8 – 3.3m (5.9- 10.8 ft) and can weigh a staggering 1,000 kg (2,200 lbs)! Native to temperate and tropical waters around the World, this Pelagic fish can swim to depths of about 600 m (2,000 ft). This monster of a fish is seemingly docile towards humans and many divers have enjoyed the company of the Ocean Sunfish while Scuba diving. The fish however is not so loved by boaters as there have been instances of sunfish colliding with boats while surfacing causing significant damage to the boats. Ocean Sunfish can even jump out the water at the surface up to a height 10 feet (3 meters) in the air and land with a splash to shake off parasites that infest their skin. (For more read: Sumo Wrester of the Seas- The Ocean Sunfish (Mola Mola) )

Sea Lamprey

The Sea Lamprey native to the Atlantic coasts of Europe and North America and even found in the Great lakes of America is a weird looking jawless fish. It possess an almost eel like body, but unlike the eel its skeleton is made of cartilage rather than bone. This parasitic fish has an unusual wide oral disc similar to a suction-cup in place of its mouth and is filled with many small teeth arranged in circular rows. While the sea lamprey appears headless it actually has functional eyes and gills just like regular fish, it has a single dorsal and ventral finfolds. Sea lampreys grow up to 1.2 m in length, weighing up to 2.5 kg. They feed on a wide variety of fish like herring, mackerel, salmon, trout and even some sharks usuing they sucker to latch on to the host preventing their blood from clotting until they die of blood loss or infection. Only one in every seven host fish will survive this deadly parasitic fish.

Trumpetfish

Named for its long, thin snout and body to match, the trumpetfish is a relative of the seahorse. Often spotted vertically to blend with vertical coral like sea whips, pipe sponges or sea fans, the trumpetfish is a master of camouflage. They can however sometimes be yellow or green, with blue or purple heads but can still easily change color. Trumpetfish ‘can grow over a meter in length, with its head representing about one third of that length. They are found pretty much all over in coral atoll reefs or in lagoons.

Dolphin Fish

This one you mostly know by its Hawaiian name Mahi-Mahi, but the dolphinfish is no where related to the mammals everyone knows as Dolphins. Found in most temperate, tropical and subtropical waters worldwide, the Mahi-Mahi is a popular for sport fishing as they dwell close to the surface. They also average 7 to 13 kilograms (15 to 29 lb) and come in dazzling colors like golden on the sides and bright blues and greens on the sides and back. It’s meat is popular in restaurants which is where you have hear of it as Mahi-Mahi and not Dolphin-fish.

*Photo Credits: photos by Olivier Egloff, Pachango, coda, fugm10, Nick Hobgood, andrew read, Flawka on flickr. Wikipedia.org (public domain images)

Did you know that nearly 71% of the Earth’s surface is covered by oceans and 80% of all life on earth is found under the ocean surface! In fact, the oceans contain 99% of the living space on the planet. The the largest animal on our planet ever(larger than the greatest dinosaurs), the blue whale still lives in the ocean and it’s heart is the size of a Volkswagen. Here are some more fascinating facts about interesting creatures of the ocean-

The Octopus

• Octopus has three hearts and its blood is light blue.
• An adult octopus can squeeze through a hole the size of a 10-cent coin.
• Octopuses are completely deaf.
• An octopus can detach itself from its arm and to escape from predators and can later regrow the limb, with no lasting ill effects.
• The blue-ringed octopus, merely the size of a golf ball, is one of the most poisonous animals on earth!

Seahorses

• Seahorses are the only animals in the entire animal kingdom in which the male, not the female gives birth and cares for their young! The female seahorse deposits the eggs into the male’s small pouch like a kangaroo where the eggs are fertilized and where the baby seahorses grow until it is time for them to be born.
• Seahorses are monogamous and mate for life! Every morning, they come together with their partner, dance, change their color, twirl around with linked tails and then separate for the rest of the day.
• While mating, seahorses utter musical sounds.
• Sea horses have a voracious appetite and can they graze continually and consume 3,000 or more brine shrimp per day.

Sea Turtles

• Sea turtles excrete salt absorbed in sea water from their eyes, which is why they seem to cry.
• Turtles live on every continent except Antarctica.
• Turtles range in size from the 4-inch Bog Turtle to the 1500 pound Leathery Turtle.
• The leatherback turtle is the largest sea turtle at 6 and a half feet long and weighing up to 1,500 lb.

Jellyfish

• Jellyfish have been around for more than 650 million years which means that they outdate both dinosaurs and sharks
• A jellyfish’s body consists of over 95% water
• The Box jellyfish has 64 anuses
• The Box jellyfish (sea wasp) kills more people than any other marine creature each year. Its sting can kill in 3 minutes… and it can move at almost 2 meters per second. If stung, the odds of getting back to the shore, or even Surviving are almost Zero. The amount of venom in a Box Jellyfish could kill 60 people
• The worlds largest known jellyfish can reach a diameter of 2.5 m / 8ft and its tentacles can grow to be half the length of a football field.

Crabs

• Crabs teeth are in their stomachs
• The Japanese Spider Crab is the oldest crab of the world and is also believed to be the most deep-living crab as well as the one with the longest lifespan. It has a walking leg span of 3 to 4 m, which can go to 8 m when outstretched.
• 8. 1 million tons of crabs are eaten annually in restaurants and homes all over the world

*Photo Credits: photos by Morten Brekkevold, San Diego Shooter, Bemep, lassi.kurkijarv, LightIsBeauty on flickr

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One of the most spectacular sights on a night dive in the ocean is to witness the hundreds of tiny star-like bioluminescent plankton scintillating like a starry sky as you move through the dark water. Towards the end of a dive, just shield your underwater flashlight and wave your hands through the water in front of you, and be mesmerized by the tiny glowing specs of plankton. So what kind of plankton are these? And how do they emit that bluish glow that you see in  the below picture of the plankton washed on shore?

Certain creatures both on land and sea can produce light through chemical reactions taking place within their bodies known as Bioluminescence. The bioluminescence results from a light-producing chemical reaction also called chemiluminescence. Certain types of chemicals when mixed together produce energy which ‘excites’ other particles on vibration and generate light which causes the glow. The group of chemicals involved to make plankton glow are broadly termed luciferins and the light is produced by a series of oxidation reactions set off by a catalyst called luciferase. The bioluminescence in plankton is very high in several forms of Plankton and is a form of cold light or luminescence.

Plankton consists of any drifting organism (plant or animal) that inhabit the oceans and provide a vital source of food to larger aquatic organisms such as fish. A vast range of plankton, both zoo plankton and single-celled animal plankton are known to be bioluminescent. Bioluminescent plankton occur in all the world’s oceans.The most common of these are Dinoflagellates which are tiny unicellular marine plankton also known as fire plants.

Dinoflagellates are the most common source of bioluminescence in our oceans and the chances are the sparks flying off your oar, the bow or wake of your boat are billions of tiny dinoflagellates or copeopods.  These creatures get their name by their ability to swim by two flagella, which are movable protein strands attached to their bodies.

Bioluminescence is used to evade predators and acts as a defense mechanism in dinoflagellates. Dinoflagelletes produce light when disturbed and will give a light flash lasting a fraction of a second. The flash is meant to attract a predator to the creature disturbing or trying to consume the dinoflagellate. The light flash also surprises the predator causing it to worry about other predators attacking it, making the predator less likely to prey on the dinoflagellate.

However the experience of swimming in  the midst of these amazing creatures is something  that must be witnessed at least once by every scuba diver or avid snorkeler. Several Dive Operators offer special bioluminescent plankton dives or snorkeling expeditions, in seasons when plankton is at its peak brought by ocean currents. These swims would usually be in absolute darkness to witness the both the starry skies above and the starry seas below.

*Photo Credits: photos by karma-police and BlueLinden on flickr

A distant cousin of the shark, Stingrays and other rays like skates, electric rays, guitarfishes and sawfishes are classified as Batoidea, a type of cartilaginous fish and have around 500 described species in thirteen families. They are pretty widespread and can be found in seas on the floor, across the world in both temperate and cold-water. The manta is an exception living in open waters and a few fresh water species living in brackish bays and estuaries.

Most species of rays have flat bodies that facilitate them to effectively conceal themselves in their environment which is the sea bed. Their disc like shape (in most ray species) have five ventral slot-like body openings called gill slits that lead from the gills and their mouths on the undersides.Because their eyes are on top of their bodies they cannot see their prey and use smell and electro-receptors similar to those of sharks.

These docile creatures are often misunderstood and categorized as dangerous which is not really the case. While they do posses stings they generally do not attack aggressively and if threatened, their primary reaction is to swim away. However, a defensive reaction causes it to whip up their stinger which is often the case when attacked by predators or stepped on. Even then, if stung by a stingray it is rarely fatal and if stung in the lower limb region will most likely just be a cut causing pain, swelling and muscle cramps from the venom, or even an infection unless it hits the upper body, a major artery or causes a very deep puncture.

Here’s a look at a few common types of Rays:

Stingrays-
Smooth Stingray or Short-tail Stingray
The Smooth Stingray also known as the short-tail stingray is the largest of the world’s stingrays. Found around South Africa, Mozambique, Australia and New Zealand, it can weigh well over 350 kg (770 lb), and sand across over 2 m (6 ft) in diameter and have an overall length of up to 4.3 m (14 ft) including it’s tail which is why it’s sometimes called bull ray. This bluish-grey or grey-brown stingray often has 2 stings, a small one in front one and the usual rear one considerably larger, which bear toxin glands.

Southern Stingray
This type of stingray is commonly found in the tropical and subtropical waters of the southern Atlantic Ocean, Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico. It has a flat, diamond-shaped body, with a mud brown upper-body, white underbelly and venomous barbed tail. Stingray City in the Grand Caymans is famous for swimming, snorkeling and diving with this type of stingray.

Blue Spotted Ray
This colorful stingray has large bright blue spots on its oval, elongated disc and blue side-stripes along the tail. They are found in the Indo-West Pacific region, mostly from the Red Sea and East Africa to the Solomon Islands, Japan and Australia. They reach a maximum length about 70 cm.

Eagle Ray-
Eagle rays unlike stingrays tend to live in the open ocean rather than on the bottom of the sea. Compared with other rays, their tails are quite long and they are a well-defined rhomboidal shape featuring distinct wings.
Spotted Eagle Ray
The spotted eagle ray is one of the most beautiful rays and is also known as the bonnet ray. It’s inky blue body is covered with almost star like white spots. Weighing about 230 kg (about 507 lbs), it wings can grow as wide as 2.5 m (8 ft) and can reach up to 5 m (16 ft) in length with its tail. Spotted eagle rays are a spectacular sight to see swimming just below the surface of open waters in large schools. They can even be spotted jumping out and across the waters sometimes.

Manta Rays
The largest of all ray species, the manta is part of the eagle ray family. Found throughout tropical waters of the world, typically around coral reefs, the manta ray can grow to a width of 7.6 meters (25 ft) across and weight about 2,300 kilograms (5,100 lb)! Their huge size
however, doesn’t in anyway affect their mobility and these giant creatures are gracefully agile underwater. Mantas are filter feeders living off plankton, fish larvae and the like frequent cleaning stations where small fish such as wrasse, remora and angelfish swim in the manta’s gills and over its skin it of parasites and dead tissue. As a diver to spot one of these magnificent creatures is often described as an experience of a lifetime and The Manta Ray Night Dive in Kailua Kona, Hawaii rated among the Top 10 Dive Sites of the World is the ultimate Manta Ray experience.

* Photo Credits: photos by jeffk42, JOE M500, Saspotato, jadam, richard ling, nhurto, Kawa0310 on flickr

Longnose Hawkfish

photo by doug.deep on flickr

Jawfish

photo by doug.deep on flickr

Flamboyant Cuttlefish

photo by NeilsPhotography on flickr

Curious Batfish

photo by CW Ye on flickr

Blue Mandarinfish

photo by Creativity+ Timothy K Hamilton on flickr

Balloonfish (Pufferfish)

photo by laszlo-photo on flickr

Skunk Anemonefish

photo by doug.deep on flickr

Hairy Frogfish

photo by CW Ye on flickr

Imperator Shrimp

photo by doug.deep on flickr

Transparent Whip Coral Goby

photo by CW Ye on flickr

Nudibranch

photo by Stephen Childs on flickr

Lizardfish

photo by doug.deep on flickr

Christmas Tree Worms

photo by doug.deep on flickr

Eastern Blue Devilfish

photo by doug.deep on flickr

Juvenile Emperor Angelfish

photo by doug.deep on flickr

Mantis Shrimp

photo by doug.deep on flickr

Red Cuttlefish

photo by doug.deep on flickr

Cleaner Shrimp on a Snake Eel

photo by doug.deep on flickr

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