Giant Oarfish

The giant oarfish (Regalecus glesne), also known as a ribbon fish, is considered to be the world's largest bony fish. This means they have a skeleton made of bone, like humans, instead of cartilage, like sharks and stingrays. The oarfish can be as long as 56 feet long and can weigh up to 600 pounds! That's a lot of fish! The oarfish is found deep in the oceans around 3,300 feet, and very seldom seen. Most information that scientist has come from dead or dying fish that float to the surface or wash ashore. They made news last year when two of the fish washed ashore in October within a week. 

The oarfish may be big, but it only eats plankton, which are very small crustaceans. They have relatively small toothless mouths and catch food through structures called gill rackers that act similar to the baleen in whales. As water goes through the gill rackers, small creatures get stuck and become a meal. The oarfish does not have scales on it's body, making them very fleshy and sustainable to injuries at the surface. 

Oarfish move like other fish, but also have the ability to hover vertically in the water by movements with their dorsal fin, which is the fin located at the top of their body. This allows them to easily move forward and backward. 

Oarfish were discovered over 200 years ago in 1772. Sightings of ones floating on the surface with their snake like appearance were often thought to be sea serpents. People who have tried eating an oarfish say it tastes like goo with the texture of gelatin. So, if you have tasted goo, you've tasted an oarfish.

Here is a good video of a living giant oarfish!

Here is one of your own to color!

Source: 5 Surprising Facts About the Oarfish That Has Been  Washing Up on Beaches, 2013, Brian Clark Howard, National Geographic, http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2013/10/131022-giant-oarfish-facts-sea-serpents/, accessed Jan. 11, 2014.

Deep Sea Angler Fish

The deep sea angler fish is found in the deepest part of the oceans of world. Where they live it is so deep that many of the creatures that live there never see sunlight. This part of the ocean is known as the abyss. The angler fish gets it's name from an appendage on it's head, called on esca, that is uses to lure it's prey toward it. Because it is hard to find prey in their dark home, angler fish can't waste the energy swimming around and hunting food. So instead, it lies in wait, using it's lure to draw other fish towards it's mouth. 

The esca contains glowing, or bioluminescent, bacteria. The bacteria and the angler fish have a symbiotic relationship, which means that they both benefit from one another by working together. When the angler fish catches a meal, the bacteria also get a free meal. So by working together, the bacteria and the angler fish get to eat.

Another strange fact about the deep sea angler fish is that the ones that are seen the most are female. The male is tiny in comparison to the female and acts like a parasite (something that lives off the energy of others). It attaches it's self to the female and glues himself to her. He then looses all other functions except his reproductive duties. 

This is an example of sexual dimorphism, which is when the male or female of the species looks totally different. Many birds also exhibit this; male birds are more flashy than female ones. Like the peacock for example; the male has a long pretty tail with lots color while the female is usually a drab brown. This allows animals to survive in different ways. For the angler fish, it can be hard to find a mate in pitch blackness, so once they find each other, they are together for live. 

Source: The Encyclopedia of Animals, 2006, Per Christiansen

Humpback Whale

The humpback whale (it's scientific name in Megaptera novaeangliae) lives in most of the oceans around of the world. They are mammals, like dogs, cats, and humans. Something that mammals have in common is that they are covered with hair, nurse their young with milk produced from their bodies, and have live births (except for a few exceptions like the platypus and echidna). Whales and other creatures like dolphins that belong to the Cetacea order have all those characteristics, even hair! 

Humpback whales can get to be as long as 52 feet. In comparison, most school buses are 45 feet long. And they can weigh as much as 7,900 pounds. So what does an animal this big eat? Other whales? Nope, it eats the total opposite. The humpback whale's diet consists mostly of krill, which are basically tiny shrimp, as well as small fish.

 In winter, when food is hard to find, it will relay on it's blubber, or fat, reserves to survive. Humpbacks swallow water and filter out krill and other food with special teeth called baleen that look like hair combs. Whales are slow swimmers so to help them catch fish, humpbacks will find a school and blow bubbles from their blow holes around it. This creates a bubble net around the fish and keeps the fish from swimming away. Once the fish are trapped, the humpback swallows the school whole.

Want to color your own? Click the image below and print it out!

Source: The Encyclopedia of Animals, 2006, Per Christiansen