Oil spill imperils an unseen world at the bottom of the gulf

[IScreamSundays]

Source: WaPo

In total darkness at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico lives a creature with many scuttling legs and two wiggling antennae that jut from a pinched, space-alien face. It is the isopod, Bathynomus giganteus, a scavenger of dead and rotten flesh on the mud floor of the gulf.

"If you think of a giant roach, put it on steroids," said Thomas Shirley, a marine biologist at Texas A&M University. "They can be scary big."

There is beauty in the lightless deep as well. Fan corals, lacylike doilies, form gardens on the seafloor and on sunken ships. The deep is full of crabs, sponges, sea anemones. Sharks hunt in the dark depths, as do sperm whales that feed on giant squid. The sperm whales have formed a year-round colony near the mouth of the Mississippi River, and have been known to rub themselves on oil pipes just like grizzlies rubbing against pine trees.

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Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/15/AR2010051503636.html

[Billy Burnett]

1. This, brought to you by the BMW 3 Series (cue squealing tires and roaring motors).

http://www.bmw.com/com/en/newvehicles/3series/coupe/2010/showroom/index.html

[gimama]

2. kick & rec bp executives

thanks for the link

[zazen]

3. "a scary big, giant roach on steroids?!!"

[eppur_se_muova]

4. Keep them out of the pantry.

[Quantess]

5. Ugggh. And I was planning on going back to bed.

That won't help me get back to sleep at all.

[zazen]

6. please tell me that's photoshopped . . . n/t

[trof]

7. Out of sight, out of mind.

If we can't see it, it can't hurt us.
:sarcasm: