Marine Biomes

The Ocean is a miraculous place filled to the brim with foreign creatures and wondrous wildlife. From the Great Orcas of the Antarctic waters to the minuscule plankton, these marine life conquer the ocean's depths, but it's not just the creatures that reside here. Coral occupy their fair share of space upon the ocean's floor filling the waters with their glamour and residential charm for those in search of shelter.

The lower shore, or low tide zone, is mostly submerged underwater. The most noticeable difference of this sub-region is the large diversity of different types of seaweeds. Organisms found in this zone are generally less adapted to periods of dryness. The creatures are generally the largest and most complex organisms on the shore as there are more sources of food as marine vegetation flourishes.

An entire new world, different from our own exists beneath the surface of our oceans. This life is full of color, shapes, sizes, wonder, and even darkness. Much of this life has yet to be explored but we still know that beneath the waves exist the most beautiful creatures and the most bizarre. Magical areas such as the coral reef and mysterious areas such as the depths of the ocean are homes to over 700,000 species that live in the ocean. This includes the eighty percent of the ocean that has yet to be explored. Even though there may be separate oceans on this planet, they are still interconnected by a body of salt water. No area of the ocean is the same, which brings us to the wonderful fact that so many different species are able to flourish

Along the coasts of rocky beaches, an intricate ecological community inhabits the ‘rocky intertidal’ areas. The variety of rocks is home to an array of slimy, squishy, and colorful organisms. This intertidal community is comprised of nine species: three different algae, three stationary filter-feeders, and three mobile consumers. The three algae, Nori Seaweed, Black Pine, and Coral Weed, are the community’s producers and inhabit the bottom of the food chain. The next three species are stationary consumers. They are Mussel, Goose Neck Barnacle, and Acorn Barnacle. Because of their consumer status, they are more competitively dominant than algae. The last three components are the mobile consumers: Whelk, Chiton, and Starfish. They

Hypoxic zones, more commonly known as ‘Dead Zones,’ can be found all over the world, with the second-largest located in the Gulf of Mexico. They are lacking in life because of the absence of the atomic number 8, otherwise known as oxygen. According to the Environmental Encyclopedia, hypoxia occurs when the content of oxygen is below or between 2-3 milligrams per liter while for healthy waters 8 milligrams need to be found (“Dead Zones”). Therefore, dead zones are begotten from the lack of a sustainable amount of oxygen in a body of water.

In this episode of the BBC documentary series, “The Blue Planet: Open Ocean,” we were able to explore the abundance and complications of the open ocean, the pelagic zone. Over 60% of our planet is covered by the ocean, yet the deep sea is largely still unknown. We know more about the moon than what we know about the deep ocean. The temperature and the level of sunlight decrease as the depth increases. The ocean may appear uniform from the surface, but there is several layers to the ocean. The pelagic zone contains the most area of the open ocean. The zone includes everything except for the coastal waters and the sea floor. However, even within this area, there are variation since some part is lifeless with very little amount of organisms and

The variations of tidal levels have created different degrees of sun and air exposure that have resulted in three zones, generally, the supra-littoral zone, littoral zone and the sub-littoral zone (See Appendix A, Figure 3). Diverse animal and plant organisms excel at surviving and dealing with different degrees of abiotic and biotic factors and as a result the rocky shore ecosystem is comprised of a series of bands known as vertical, or in this instance, intertidal zonation (See Appendix A, Figure 1). Abiotic stresses such as light intensity and wave action typically set the upper boundaries where as biotic stresses set the lower boundaries and limit the distribution of many organisms to particular strata (See Appendix A, Figure 2). It is due to the species distribution among the different zones that the rocky shore ecosystems cannot be defined as a uniform habitat, rather a dynamic and complex one (Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre, 2013).

During the summers the oxygen content atop the water normally has a salinity level consistent with “more than 8 milligrams per liter”; but when oxygen content drops down to “less than 2 milligrams per liter” the water is then known to be in hypoxic state (CENR, 2000; USGS, 2006). Hypoxia is the result of oxygen levels decreasing to the point where aquatic organisms can no longer survive in the water column. Organisms such as fish, shrimps, and crabs are capable to evacuate the area but the fauna that cannot move either become stress and/or die. Due to this, many call the hypoxia zone the “dead zone” (Overview, 2008; USGS, 2006).

The Ocean. Commonly known, as the big blue is one of the most ecologically diverse habitats on earth. It is home to 7000,000 million different species, all of which directly rely on the stability and natural habitats, which exist around the globe. In fact, over two thirds of the species living in the ocean are unknown (DNews). The industrial revolution changed the world for the better; the industrial revolution introduced hundreds of new products, which changed the way humans live. Throughout this paper we will discuss the causes and solutions to environmental degradation in the ocean.

Floras and microbes are additional main biotic mechanisms of many oceanic ecosystems. Microbes act as decomposers for oceanic ecosystems, and they break defunct living matter and transforms it into vitality that is used by other existing organisms in the oceanic ecosystem. Detrivores, which are a type of animal, also eat deceased or putrefying plants and animal matter. Algae, which are autotrophs, appear as the head herbal vivacity and primary producers in oceanic ecosystems. The sunlight transforms the light into energy for nourishment for marine plants. Heat and light are focal abiotic factors discovered in essentially all oceanic ecosystems, consequently oceanic ecosystems has some broaden abiotic mechanisms, comprising viscosity and many more. The power that the bulk of an organism is called buoyancy. The durability of the drive of seawater is called viscosity. These abiotic factors source to the drive of all organisms in oceanic systems. Sunlight pierces the sea exterior only about 65 feet. As there is more salt in the Great Barrier Reef than in other oceanic ecosystems the marine holds less oxygen than the

Rocky Shores are found where the sea meets the land which supports a diverse mix of plants and animals that have adapted to survive in the unique conditions of constant wave action as well as the fall of tides (Ehp.qld. 2016). Most of the ecosystems flora and fauna live in the intertidal zone, between high and low tide (Ehp.qld. 2016). They are exposed to two environments, being crushed by waves and swamped by the sea water, extreme temperatures and salinity, and left unprotected

The off-shore marine environment changes intensively with the change in the ocean depth. There are three distinctive zones that can be classified along the depth which is the Epipelagic which extends from the sea surface to a depth of 200 meters, the mesopelagic which extends from a depth of 200 meters to a depth of a 1000 meters and then the Deep sea which extends from a depth of a 1000 meters to the sea floor (Castro & Huber, 2010). The Deep sea can then be divided into a further three zones (Figure 01) Bathypelagic which extends from a depth of a 1000 meters to 4000 meters, Abyssopelagic which extends from a depth of 4000 meters to 6000 meters and then the Hadopelagic which extends which extends from a depth of 6000 meters to the sea floor (Castro & Huber, 2010).

It is shown that with the ocean, one of the biggest factors in order to promote the diversity within it is how fast the water flows, it is proven that with the increase in flow, along with it comes the number of invertebrate species that live under the rocks within that water. 3

The intertidal rocky shore of Caloundra Beach is inhabited by diverse range of biodiversity of animals and plants, many of which have developed high levels of adaptations throughout their existence. The very boundary of marine and terrestrial ecosystem, this environment is subjected to extremes of the physical environment such as temperature, desiccation, wave turbulence as well the ecological interactions that commonly occur in biotic communities (e.g. competition, predation). However Rocky intertidal shores are easily accessible by humans and provide an enjoyable opportunity for passive recreation and for science and environmental education as well.

One of the organisms I have chosen, the Red Waratah anemone (Actinia tenebrosa) was found in the mid tide zone and the low tide zone. This anemone is the main prey of the predator Grey side-gilled sea slug, which is the other organism I have chosen,