The Jurassic Sea: The Most Dangerous Place for Me

The Jurassic seas are probably one of the most dangerous seas of all time. Now the dinosaurs may have been pretty big on land, but the only things that could outweigh them were the animals underwater.

Now we start out with one large, meat-eating land carnivore called eustreptospondylus. They were about as big as a giraffe. Now these animals aren't as big as t-rex, probably not even as big as an allosaurus. Maybe bigger maybe not.

But let me tell you something, these carnivores would still eat plenty of food. And I don't know, maybe one small, juicy, rhamphorhynchus. Rhamphorhynchus are these small pterosaurs. They may be a bit small but they're worth the fight.

 But now we will talk about the underwater world. Now underwater: one huge enormous reptile is about to strike. The reptile is called liopleurodon. The liopleurodon is the biggest meat-eater that ever lived. And this large predator is about to strike the ophthalmosaurus. The ophthalmosaurus is in the ichthyosaur family. And they have good night vision probably because of eyes the size of softballs. But even with those softball sized eyes, they won't be able to see the enormous, monstrous liopleurodon who is about to strike.

But wait a second, liopleurodon sees another animal. It's called hybodus, a very small shark but it lived for quite a long time. These creatures survived from the Permian period to the Cretaceous. But even the small hybodus will never be able to fight the liopleurodon. Liopleurodon eat sharks like we eat fish. Well we do eat sharkfin soup. And the shark takes its last look and then WHAM! the shark gets eaten.

But what's in the shadow over there? It's the largest fish ever. It's called leedsichthys. It's a pretty slow swimmer and it's a very, very, vulnerable animal. One of them has fallen behind and it's getting eaten alive by some hybodus and a marine crocodile called metriorhynchus. Metriorhynchus is one of your stranger crocodiles. It's like the leedsichthys is getting mosquito bites. Eventually leedsichthys will die. 8 hours later, now leedsichthys is dead. And now the liopleurodon are snacking on that humungous leedsichthys.

And well well looky here it's the ophthalmosaurus and he's trying to make a snack out of these ammonites. Ammonites are related to today's nautilus. Now imagine it as a unpoppable ballon. and when it is poppable, it will squirt out the air, which is the ink.

(image of Eustreptospondylus from walkingwith.wikia.com)

(image of Rhamphorhynchus from kidsdinos.com)

 (image of Liopleurodon from seamonsters.wikia.com)

 (image of Opthalmosaurus from http://www.abc.net.au)

(image of Hybodus from http://www.abc.net.au)

(image of Leedsichthys from bbc.co.uk)

(image of Metriorhynchus from bbc.co.uk)

(image of an ammonite from fossilmoldsandreplicas.com)

Dive to the Depths

Ready to go down deep? Well, the deep is a long way to reach the bottom. There's only one sub that can go deeper than any submarine: the deepest submarine is called "Alvin." The deepest diving sub ever made.

And all's ashore that's going ashore! So, this is the sunlight zone. Where we here will find the most life. You can find many sea otters sleeping in the giant kelp. And as the clown-fish are protected by the anemone. And where all the dolphins are searching for some delicious fish to eat. The great white sharks are hunting for schools of fish, or a seal at least.

And now we go deeper. This zone is called the twilight zone. Down here we can find this really rare battle that no one has seen before. And the battle is giant squid (or colossal squid) versus sperm whale! Never before seen battle at nature.

And now we go deeper, to some of the deepest of sites: the dark zone, and don't forget your flashlights. Down here we shall find many strange fish. One of these fish is called the angler fish. Only the females have that crazy light that attracts prey. And some fish have stolen the angler fish's mechanism. Other creatures like the viper fish also have this feature.

Now we go deeper, to the darkest of them all: welcome to the abyss! Down here we won't be finding much life. Life down here can be pretty tight. There are rat-tail fish and dumbo octopus. And you may also find plenty of six-gill sharks.

But now we bring to the secret depth: it's trenches! Life is so rare down here. But here's what you can find: vent fish, vent shrimp, vent crabs, and Pompeii worms. And that's all!

Oh and by the way, sorry we couldn't find a picture that included a trench.

(illustration from sjfc.edu)

Megalodon vs. Prosqualodon

Alright, this is another prehistoric one - or more like two posts in one. A couple million years ago when our ancestors were becoming less ape-like and in fact a whole new animal form, Australopithecus --well we're talking about what was happening under water. Now you know that old great white shark, well millions of years ago about when the Australopithecus was roaming the earth, under the water was a shark called megalodon. And this enormous shark was bigger than today's great white. In fact, it was the size of a Greyhound bus. There was a rival, much smaller than it. The rival is called prosqualodon. Now it is much small than a megalodon. Alright, here we have the fight in action. Now first we have a megalodon swimming through the sea, minding its own business, but then comes a small prosqualodon. Then the ginormous megalodon attacks the prosqualodon. But the prosqualodon hunts in packs, so there are many more prosqualodons. And the other prosqualodons start biting at the megalodon's gills. Now the one prosqualodon might have been killed, but look at megalodon. He's got quite a few scars, too. And the picture may look like a dolphin, but believe me that is the prosqualodon.

(image of megalodon from en.wikipedia.org)

(image of prosqualodon from blogevolved.blogspot.com)

Rat trap fish

The rat trap fish is a deep-sea fish, so don't expect to find it in any coral reefs. It lives in the dark zone where no light reaches. The rat trap fish uses red light to make it seem invisible, well at least it's face: it has some red light on the cheek. And then it attacks! Because this rat trap fish is the only deep-sea creature that can see red light.