(Click to enlarge image) The nine known species of rare, primitive finned octopods are commonly called "Dumbos" because they flap a pair of large ear-like fins to swim, akin to the cartoon flying elephant. One of the deep sea's largest animals, this specimen was collected at about 3500 meters on a 2009 Census of Marine Life MAR-ECO cruise to the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. (Credit: Michael Vecchione, Census of Marine Life)

From the Edge of Darkness to the Black Abyss: Marine Scientists Census 17,500+ Species and Counting

Explorers report deep sea teeming with species that have never known sunlight; Describing all new species in a cup of deep seafloor mud “a daunting challenge; ”Discovered: jumbo “Dumbo” octopod and its new-to-science cousin; Video captures “wildcat” tubeworm drilling for oil on ocean floor; Vibrant coral gardens found amid  Pacific “Graveyard” of seamounts; En route to historic 1st global ocean Census: Oct. 2010

Census of Marine Life scientists have inventoried an astonishing abundance, diversity and distribution of deep sea species that have never known sunlight – creatures that somehow manage a living in a frigid black world down to 5,000 meters (~3 miles) below the ocean waves.

Revealed via deep-towed cameras, sonar and other vanguard technologies, animals known to thrive in an eternal watery darkness now number 17,650, a diverse collection of species ranging from crabs to shrimp to worms. Most have adapted to diets based on meager droppings from the sunlit layer above, others to diets of bacteria that break down oil, sulfur and methane, the sunken bones of dead whales and other implausible foods.

Five of the Census’ 14 field projects plumb the ocean beyond light, each dedicated to the study of life in progressively deeper realms – from the continental margins (COMARGE: Continental Margins Ecosystems) to the spine-like ridge running down the mid-Atlantic (MAR-ECO: Mid-Atlantic Ridge Ecosystem Project), the submerged mountains rising from the seafloor (CenSeam: Global Census of Marine Life on Seamounts), the muddy floor of ocean plains (CeDAMar: Census of Diversity of Abyssal Marine Life), and the vents, seeps, whale falls and chemically-driven ecosystems found on the margins of mid-ocean ridges and in the deepest ocean trenches (ChEss:Biogeography of Deep-Water Chemosynthetic Systems).

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• Program Update: Census of Marine Life – May 2010