Creep into the Deep™
Virtual Research Mission to the Deep-Sea
Deep Sea Scientist Bios:
Dr. Les Watling
Hey Kids,
Jake, the SeaDog here, I caught up deep-sea scientist and explorer, Dr. Les Watling. He is the Professor and Graduate Chair, Pew Fellow in Marine Conservation Department of
Zoology, University of Hawai'i at Manoa.
Dr. Watling shared a little of his
extraordinary life as an ocean scientist with us....
Les, what is your favorite animal?
I really like crustaceans (crabs and shrimp and the relatives) and
gorgonians (sea fans).
What do you study?
I study the octocorals in the
deep-sea. They get their name from the fact that they have 8 tentacles that
they use to catch their food.
What got you interested in the deep-sea? My interest in the deep sea started in college. I was very interested in marine biology and spent a lot of time studying animals living in shallow water, on rocks or on mud flats, or in sandy beaches. But I gradually became aware that there were creatures in the deep sea that were different from anything I had seen. Some of these animals were really amazing in the way they moved, what they looked like, and so on. I knew that one day I had to go to the deep sea to see these things for myself.
What's the most amazing experience you've had?
I love to watch animals alive to see how they do things. How do they move? How do they catch their food? How do they avoid being eaten themselves? I have watched very tiny animals that I found in tide pools and I have sat on the bottom of the ocean in a submarine and watched large and small things moving around. All of it is amazing and when I'm in the water I am never bored. One day I discovered that a deep sea shrimp, which had been seen and photographed hundreds of times, had a way of swimming that was different from all other shrimp in the ocean. But I knew how shrimp normally swim, so it was real plain to me that this particular shrimp was very different. Discoveries like that are a lot of fun to make.What is the coolest animal you've seen in the deep-sea? By far the coolest animals in the deep sea are the gorgonians, also called sea fans, in the octocoral group. A lot of them are not very fan-like in their overall shape, but they are all beautiful!
What are two things do you do in your home to help the environment? We recycle as much as we can, although here in Hawaii that is not easy and a lot of things that are recyclable on the mainland are not recyclable here. And we use solar panels to heat out hot water during the day.
What are you hoping to learn/discover on this research cruise? I want to find new species of deep sea octocorals. These will be things never seen before and I will get to describe what they look like and give them names.
Back to
Creep into the Deep, deep-sea scientist Bios Creep into the Deep
GO TO KID'S PAGE
WhaleTimes, Inc. is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) corporation. Find out how to support WhaleTimes education programs.
Copyright 2009-1995 WhaleTimes,
Inc. All Rights Reserved. No portion of this website can be used in any other
works without written permission of
WhaleTimes,
Inc.