One Ocean, Many Worlds of Life - Convention on Biological Diversity

flickr/max_westby
<strong>Many</strong> Areas, <strong>One</strong> <strong>Ocean</strong>
If it is true that the ocean is divided into many different areas, it is also true
that there is much to connect them all, and to connect the ocean to the
land and the air. Sea turtles hatch on sandy beaches but then spend decades
swimming in the open ocean before females
return to the same beach from which they
came to lay a clutch <strong>of</strong> eggs and begin the
cycle anew. Emperor penguin chicks hatch,
and are raised, far inland during the Antarctic
midwinter, until eventually making their way
to the coasts, resting on ice and swimming
in the nearshore waters <strong>of</strong> the Southern
<strong>Ocean</strong>. Marine iguanas on the Galapagos
Islands spend most <strong>of</strong> their time basking in
the sun to warm up and roughly two hours
a day swimming in the chilly waters, grazing
on seaweed—the only species <strong>of</strong> lizard that
routinely dives into the sea.
The marine iguana (Amblyrhynchus
cristatus) lives and forages in the
sea <strong>of</strong>f the Galápagos Islands
Emperor penguin (Aptenodytes
forsteri), Antarctica
Pacific bluefin tuna breed in the western Pacific, swim east to the central
California coast to spawn and then migrate to the South Pacific, the largest
known home range among marine species. Gray whales swim from Alaska
to Baja California and back; some humpback whales swim from Antarctica
to the waters <strong>of</strong>f Costa Rica, around 8,300 kilometres away, the longest
migration <strong>of</strong> any mammal. But even the humpback must tip its metaphorical
<strong>One</strong> <strong>Ocean</strong>, <strong>Many</strong> WOrlds Of life
flickr/ianduffy
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