Main Menu
Join Undercurrent on Facebook

The Private, Exclusive Guide for Serious Divers Since 1975 | |
For Divers since 1975
The Private, Exclusive Guide for Serious Divers Since 1975
"Best of the Web: scuba tips no other
source dares to publish" -- Forbes
X
May 2015    Download the Entire Issue (PDF) Available to the Public Vol. 41, No. 5   RSS Feed for Undercurrent Issues
What's this?

Leave the Nautilus Alone

from the May, 2015 issue of Undercurrent   Subscribe Now

The nautilus is an amazing creature, roaming the Indo- Pacific water for the past 500 million years. But if a dive boat you're on pulls one out of the water to show passengers, tell them to throw it back. While the nautilus has adapted to everything from asteroid collisions to climate change, this living fossil is dying off in zoos and aquariums around the world, and exhibiting them on dive boats is not helping.

A team of scientists in Washington D.C. wanted to know why the nautilus can live 15 years or more in its natural habitat but only up to three years in captivity, so it studied captive mollusks from the city's National Zoo. In a study published in Zoo Biology, they state that once the nautilus is removed from its natural environment, a thick, rough, black substance develops on a portion of its smooth white shell. The substance is a heavy protein that leads to excess amounts of copper, which can be harmful to shell formation. Researchers think it's caused by environmental stress from being in captivity.

In the wild, overfishing has slashed nautilus numbers by as much as 80 percent in once-rich areas like Australia's Great Barrier Reef and the Philippines' Bohol Strait. With virtually no international sanctions limiting the capture and trade of the nautilus, shells can sell for several hundred dollars. The United States alone imports 100,000 nautilus shells each year. But for the nautilus's sake, divers and dive boats should just leave them alone -- and untouched -- in their natural habitat.

I want to get all the stories! Tell me how I can become an Undercurrent Online Member and get online access to all the articles of Undercurrent as well as thousands of first hand reports on dive operations world-wide


Find in  

| Home | Online Members Area | My Account | Login | Join |
| Travel Index | Dive Resort & Liveaboard Reviews | Featured Reports | Recent Issues | Back Issues |
| Dive Gear Index | Health/Safety Index | Environment & Misc. Index | Seasonal Planner | Blogs | Free Articles | Book Picks | News |
| Special Offers | RSS | FAQ | About Us | Contact Us | Links |

Copyright © 1996-2024 Undercurrent (www.undercurrent.org)
3020 Bridgeway, Ste 102, Sausalito, Ca 94965
All rights reserved.

cd