Stories from the Ocean
By spreading the unique voices from the ocean: its stories and its extraordinary journeys,
we can gain a greater understanding of the ocean’s multi-faceted nature,
its vibrancy and the changing circumstances of life under the water.
STINGRAYS
ORDER: B ATOIDEA
DID YOU KNOW?
A group of stingrays is
called a ‘fever’ .
Many stingrays like to
live by themselves but
will gather together for
feeding, breeding and
migration.
STING I N THE TA I L!
Stingrays have a barbed, venomous spine located on their tail. Stingrays
don’t attack with their ‘sting’, but if provoked will use their barb out of
defence. To do this, they raise their tail up and then flick it lik e a whip,
causing their barb to pierce anything in close range. Stings are painful, but
usually not fatal.
FLAT SHARK?
A close relative of the shark, stingrays have skeletons composed of
cartilage. They are distinguished from sharks by a flattened body, which
varies from circular to diamond-like in shape.
DA I LY GRIND
Stingrays have flat grinding teeth like a fine-toothed comb, which they
use to crush food such as crabs, mussels and squid. A stingray’s mouth is
underneath its body, helping it to slurp up food from the sea floor!
FLYING FORWARDS OR WAVING BACKWARDS
To propel themselves through the water stingrays such as eagle rays ‘flap’
their fins like a bird. Other stingrays, such as the smooth ray, move their
fins in a wave –like motion and can swim backwards!
HIDE AND SEEK
You can find stingrays in warm shallow water. They spend most of their
time near the sea floor and will hide buried underneath the sand.
SWIMMING HORSES?
Seahorses are fish! Covered in bony plates of scales they have a tail that
can curl and eyes that can move independently.
There are hundreds of varieties of seahorses.
SEAHORSES SUCK!
Seahorses use their long straw-like mouths to suck up small crustaceans.
They have no teeth and swallow the shrimp whole. Seahorses eat
throughout the day as they cannot store food in their stomach for long.
AQUAT I C DANCERS
Seahorses may be the slowest fish in the ocean but they can swim
forwards, backwards, upwards and downwards. They have two sets of fins
instead of 5, and can beat their fins up to 70 times per second.
LOVE STORY
Seahorses keep the same partner and will choose someone the same
size. When courting and mating, seahorses dance together, synchronizing
their movements and linking their tails to whirl around in unison. When
their waltz is done, it is the male that takes the eggs and becomes
pregnant! The eggs attach to the lining of his pouch. He nourishes them,
giving birth 2-3 weeks later to 200 - 720 babies!
SEAHORSE
Hippocampus
DID YOU KNOW?
Seahorses get their
scientific name from
their 2 key features:
a horse shaped head
(Ippos = horse) and
curved tail (Kampe =
curved).
GREEN SEA TURTLE
CHELONIA MYDAS
DID YOU KNOW?
Green turtles are the
most common species
of marine turtle in the
Indian Ocean.
EASY BEING GREEN
Green sea turtles get their name from their greenish body fat not their
shell colour!
TURTELY UNIQUE
There are 7 marine turtles worldwide . Green sea
turtles have a dome like shell that is tear-drop shaped, 4 pairs of costal
scales and two thick scales between the eyes.
BIG GREEN E ATING MACHINES
Turtles are the only group of reptiles that don’t have teeth! Instead they
have beaks that are adapted for feeding.
Adult green sea turtles are vegitarian and use their beak to scrape algae
off rocks and corals. Their jaws also work alike scissors - perfect for cutting
off some seagrass and algae to eat.
By grazing on the tips of seagrass green turtles increase the productivity
and nutrient quality of seagrass blades, helping to maintain a healthy
ecosystem.
SWIFT SWIMMERS
Sea turtles can’t pull their limbs into their shell like land tortoises, instead
they are built for swiftness with strong front flippers designed for paddling
and diving!
When turtles dive they dive to the seafloor to eat and ‘sleep’. Green sea
turtles can stay underwater for upto 5 hours due to their large flexible
lungs and the extra oxygen carrying cells in their blood.
They are also ableto control their metabolism and slow their heart rate to conserve oxygen -
their heart may beat just once every 9 minutes!
Sponge Hotels
Sponges are animals filled with holes, canals and chambers. They suck water through these canals to eat and breathe.
The canals are also perfect hiding places for small animals giving sponges an important role as ‘hotels of the sea’.
