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Scientists have gained a rare glimpse into the sex life of the mysterious deep-sea squid.

By studying footage taken by underwater vehicles, US researchers have found that this rarely seen creature will often engage in same-sex mating.

They believe this is because encounters with potential mates in the dark depths are rare, and the squid may be unable to tell the sexes apart.

The study is published in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters.

The researchers looked at video footage taken over 20 years by Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs), most of which was recorded in the Monterey Submarine Canyon, off the coast of California.

The species that was observed is called Octopoteuthis deletron, a tentacled beast that measures about 12cm-long (5in), with impressive hook-lined arms...

Bowhead whales, the giants of the Arctic, are using the Northwest Passage to move across the top of the Americas.

Skeletons, DNA samples and harpoon heads have all suggested that bowhead populations living on each side of the continent did meet and mingle.

Now, research published in the journal Biology Letters has used satellite tags to provide confirmation.

The work may provide insights into the development of Arctic cultures in which bowhead hunting plays a central role.

Mads Peter Heide-Jorgensen from the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources led a team that has satellite-tagged more than 100 bowheads over the last decade – much of the work funded by oil and gas companies interested in the Arctic’s new mineral wealth.

Last August, as the Arctic sea ice neared its annual minimum, the...

What has happened at the Cabo Pulmo marine reserve off the southern tip of the Baja Peninsula is fishy – in a good way.

Once severely depleted of fish, the reef system off Cabo Pulmo now teems with marine life, thanks to fishing restrictions imposed more than 10 years ago.

But environmentalists are worried that that ecological advance will be lost if the Mexican government allows a $2 billion development plan to go ahead that would place a “new Cancun” less than three miles north of the Cabo Pulmo marine sanctuary.

Mexico’s Secretariat of Environment and Natural Resources has given Spanish developer Hansa Urbana all but final approval for the project, which would turn desert scrubland into a bustling development of hotels, condos, golf courses and a large marina.

The government says such a...

Scientists are starting a novel project to investigate whether overfishing alters fish behaviour and changes their pattern of development.

Overexploitation of stocks has already been shown to select for smaller fish.

A team reporting at the meeting of the European Society for Evolutionary Biology in Germany will deliberately remove the largest individuals from populations of lab-bred guppies.

The experiment is designed to uncover what is happening in our oceans.

“There are clear indications that almost all… commercial fish are shrinking,” said marine biologist Carl Lundin, who directs the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s Global Marine and Polar Program.

For mass spawning fish such as cod, there is a great advantage to maintaining older, larger females because they are ...

Previously considered the ultimate marine survivors, and garnered the infamous designation of being the “cockroaches of the open waters,” jellyfish are doling out the comeuppance to those who ever doubted their predatory skills.

These aren’t just gelatinous scavengers capable of living in overheated, acidic, and polluted seas – no, jellyfish are the new sharks.

The silent and slow-swimming gelatinous animals can punch just as much of an impact on the food web, and are taking over the top predator position in the ocean.

Even though its attack is not based on a visually coordinated strike, like that of a shark or tuna for example, jellyfish can eat their weight in crustacean prey making them predatory competitors with larger fish.

“In spite of their primitive life-style, jellyfishes exhibit...

A massive dust storm in the northeast of Africa shrouded much of the Red Sea during Thursday, 15 September 2011.

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA

Dolphin watchers in west Wales have spotted unusual behaviour as a female repeatedly tossed a newborn calf into the air.

They say it is the first time such ‘violent’ behaviour has been seen by a mother in Cardigan Bay although males dolphins do sometimes kill the young.

Dr Peter Evans, from the Sea Watch Foundation, said it might have been a case of a severe telling off, because the calf was wandering away from her.

He added the youngster was unharmed.

“She was nosing it away in a particular direction, then suddenly she threw the infant right up into the air, and then did this about three times,” Dr Evans said.

“Normally when you see something like an animal thrown into the air it’s an aggressive action by a male dolphin,” he said.

Dr Evans said there were cases of male bottle nose dolphi...

Time and again we hear arguments in favor of ecotourism, only to then discover cases where human visitation to wilderness sites has negative impacts, both on individual species and entire ecosystems.

One of the most recent examples of this comes from research on Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, where high levels of disease prevalence have been found among corals near tourist visitation platforms.

Coral diseases have been recognized as one of the major factors in coral reef degradation worldwide; although it is not yet clear how and why these infections develop, they are likely influenced by human activities that alter the marine environment, reduce immune function in the corals, and/or increase pathogen virulence.

For instance, platforms that are built for human visitation often attract s...

Coral reefs are on course to become the first ecosystem that human activity will eliminate entirely from the Earth, a leading United Nations scientist claims.

He says this event will occur before the end of the century, which means that there are children already born who will live to see a world without coral.

The claim is made in a book published in the United States today, which says coral reef ecosystems are very likely to disappear in what would be ”a new first for mankind – the ‘extinction’ of an entire ecosystem”.

Its author, Professor Peter Sale, studied the Great Barrier Reef for 20 years at the University of Sydney. He currently leads a team at the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health.

The predicted decline is mainly down to climate change and oce...

An international team of scientists is urging that industrial fishing of the world