A Fish Out Of Water…

I don’t have a TV in Oxford but do in France. I pay the BBC license fee in the UK because I think the BBC is the greatest British institution. Sadly iPlayer doesn’t work in France and I can’t tell it that I am a paid-up member and should be entitled to view. So I subscribed to Netflix which, unlike Amazon Prime, does work in France through my PS3. The point of this is that last night I watched two episodes of David Attenburgh’s Life – Creatures of the Deep and Fish. I love aquatic organisms and rather pride myself on knowing a lot about them.

I have had to re-evaluate my assessment of my understanding having been utterly blown away by the weirdness of the organisms in the two episodes. Colourful starfish and sea urchins gorging on a dead seal; female-impersonating male squid; a female octopus that died to support her developing young (quite moving); the mating habits of flying fish; the weedy sea dragon; and the sarcastic fringehead. My two favourites, though, were the convict fish and the small mudskipper. The first two clips below have been treated by whoever copied them from the BBC with a bright patch in the centre of the picture so that the BBC’s robots don’t recognise them on YouTube – it’s quite annoying but you get the gist.

Mudskipper

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Convict fish

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Inevitably, having ripped these clips from YouTube videos I ended up browsing and found the following two clips as well. I could save them for later in the week but let’s plough on that, surfeiting, the appetite may sicken, and so die.

Firstly a wolverine that seems to be semi-domesticated as it spends its time on a lead. I don’t know the context of this clip but I was amazed by its sense of smell. From previous posts you will know that molecules evaporate when they have sufficient energy to escape their liquid phase. The wolverine is able to smell frozen food buried under snow. The smell molecules are volatile but they are bound up in frozen meat. They need to make their way to the meat’s surface, diffuse through the snow and, having finally reached the liberation of free air, enter the nose of the wolverine . It cannot be many molecules that make it so the wolverine must have an amazing sense of smell.

Wolverine

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Finally, a bit of Brian Cox who always throws some delightful physics into his discussions of biology. Those of you who listen to the Infinite Monkey Cage will know that he often pretends to pour scorn on sciences other than physics – especially biology. The truth is that biology depends upon physics and he brings a terrific understanding to the subject. The more you know, the more you realise that there is much yet to know. I laughed at his definition of gravity right at the beginning; “following geodesics through curved spacetime”. Socrates is alleged to have said, “The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.” Nothing, in this sense, being an insubstantial proportion of all that there is to know. I love finding out new things and being surprised by new discoveries. Prof Cox often makes me question what I think I know.

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Questions…

1. When discussing evolution, animals like mudskippers (and the fossil Tiktaalik) are often called transitional forms. What does this mean and how does it apply to a mudskipper?
2. Why must a mudskipper avoid drying out when it is out of water (try to be specific)?
3. To which invertebrate phylum does an octopus belong?
4. Suggest a way in which you can see that a wolverine is a typical mammal.
5. What specific dietary nutrient does a wolverine get from meat?
6. Which has a larger surface area to volume ratio, a grape or a melon?
7. Kinetic energy is ½mv² – how do you calculate the gravitational potential energy that an object has?
8. Name a force other than gravity or electromagnetism.
9. What are the four fundamental forces of Nature?
10. From which Shakespeare play was I quoting in the third paragraph, and what does it mean?