The Octonauts and the Pelagic Zone
By Gale Force
Kwazii Cat surfaced in the launch bay with his Gup-B.
Extending out into the water from the launch deck was a large box-like object made of sturdy plastic pipe.
Carefully, applying just a little bit of power, Kwazii guided his Gup into this cradle, while Tweak Bunny watched from the launch deck.
Once the Gup was safely in the cradle, Kwazii climbed out and onto the deck.
"Ready for lift off, Tweak," he called to Tweak cheerfully.
Tweak pressed a button and the cradle was winched several feet out of the water.
Kwazii picked up a power spray hose and proceeded to carefully rinse algae and other marine life from his Gup. It had taken him a while to get used to how much marine life could attach to the outside of his Gup, even when he was driving it as fast as possible through the water!
Once the Gup was clean, Tweak lowered the cradle back into the water. The cradle sank below the surface, taking the Gup with it.
All of the Gups had their own cradles, and when one of the Gups was needed, the mechanism that controlled all the cradles, like a merry-go-round, turned until the correct one was in position and then lifted it up to the surface.
This was something that was never shown in the Training Adventures that the Octonauts had filmed for youngsters interested in their activities, because it was felt that it slowed down the story. Captain Barnacles had argued with the "top brass" at TechnoOcean that children and adults would love to see the intricacies of this essential step, but had been over-ruled.
It was the responsibility of whoever piloted a Gup to clean if off once it had returned to the Octopod – unless that same Gup was due to go out again the same day, of course. This rule was only broken if the Octonauts were on a mission and needed to get to the HQ in a hurry. Then the pilot was allowed to clean the Gup once the mission was over – or the Vegimals might help out if they had time apart from their duties. This was a rule Captain Barnacles had put in place when the Octonauts had first began, and he never shirked his cleaning duty, as he liked to set a good example for his crew.
Only once had Captain Barnacles let the Gups go uncleaned for any length of time – when they were filming one of their adventures which brought home the lesson that if you let your Gups get filthy dirty, they'd be of prime interest to a shark. This was another adventure Barnacles had objected to – no one would believe that Kwazzi would ever have let his much-loved Gup get into such a filthy state in the first place! But he'd been over-ruled again. "Dramatic license," the official at TechnoOcean had called it.
Kwazii finished rinsing off the Gup, and stowed away the cleaning gear.
"Class is going to start in five minutes, Kwazii," Tweak said, looking up at the chronometer on one of the walls. A "watch" was what landlubbers called something that told time. In the ocean, it was a "chronometer," because it had a lot more functions than just serving as something that told time. It was pronounced "Kruh-nom-uh-ter."
"I'm on my way there, Tweak," Kwazii said. "Are you coming?"
"Yes. I just want to make a couple more adjustments to the bubble engine. It won't take me two minutes."
"Okay, see you there."
Some weeks ago, the Vegimals had told Shellington Sea Otter that they wanted to learn about oceanography.
The Vegimals had been an integral part of the Octonaut crew ever since Shellington had found...perhaps rescued might be a better word….them a few years ago. They had become much-loved within a few days of their hatching because of their childlike demeanor and interest in everything, and had taken over the work in the Garden Pod with gusto. They had become expert chefs. Then they had impressed with their engineering skills, first creating Vegi-bot and then the Gup V, when the rest of the Octonauts had had to be rescued from the Snot Blob on Christmas day.
Shellington was sure that they would be able to learn the principles of oceanography very quickly, and perhaps even become experts in certain fields if they so desired.
So, he'd agreed to give a class once a week on a certain topic in oceanography. It would be held over lunch time in the Video Room, which had a large movie screen and theater seating.
Shellington had invited the rest of the Octonauts to attend if they wished, and Captain Barnacles had expressed enthusiasm for the idea. He didn't want to make the class mandatory, so he thought the idea of holding it the Video Room was a good one. That way any of his crew who preferred to eat lunch in the dining room would not feel pressured to attend a class.
But as he had expected, all of the Octonauts crew were happy to attend these classes, not the least because they would be gathered together with their friends but also because each of them enjoyed learning.
After all, Barnacles and Tweak were engineers and explorers. Kwazii was an explorer and an adventurer. Dashi was an expert with computers and photography. Peso was a medic. Only Shellington and Professor Inkling were actual scientists, so each of the other Octonauts would all be learning something new at these classes.
Tunip, Barrot, Tominnow, Grouber and Codish trooped into the Video Room, followed by Captain Barnacles and Dashi carrying trays on which were hot chocolate and kelp cakes.
The Vegimals took their seats in the front row, where the seats had been specially sized to fit them comfortably.
The rest of the Octonauts seated themselves, although Professor Inkling remained in his hoverchair.
Shellington stood beside a lectern, facing his audience calmly.
"Vegimals, Octonauts," he said, "Welcome to your first lesson in Oceanography. Today's first lesson is on the names of the various parts of the water column."
"Wawa com?" burbled Tunip.
"Yes, Tunip. Remember that one word can have many different meanings. A column is a structure that holds up a building, for example. Or we speak of a "column of figures" when we're doing math. In oceanography, the water column refers to a region of the ocean that extends from the surface all the way to the ocean floor. Peso, you already know the names of three parts of the water column. What are they?"
"The sunlight zone, the twilight zone and the midnight zone," Peso said promptly.
Shellington nodded.
"Exactly. The sunlight zone is at the top part of the water column. It receives enough sunlight so that plants can generate energy using what's called photosynthesis. Photosynthesis does not mean taking photos. Photo is the Greek word for light.
The sunlight zone is approximately 660 feet deep, or 200 meters. Sharks, dolphins, tuna and jellyfish are a few of the creatures that live in the sunlight zone, and there's plankton and seaweed here as well.
Next comes the twilight zone. That's where the light is very gloomy, if you can see at all. It extends from 660 feet all the way down to 3,000 feet, or 1,000 meters. Creatures like swordfish and squid live in this region."
"Swordfish?" said Kwazii. "I've seen them near the surface. Remember my adventure when I was looking for the sword of the pirate king?"
"You're right, Kwazii. Swordfish live in the sunlight zone as well. But unlike the other creatures they are equally as home in the twilight zone."
Kwazii nodded.
"Finally," said Shellington, "there's the midnight zone. That's where no light penetrates at all. Yet there's life down there. You all remember are adventure at the hydrothermic vent. Squid and octopus live down here, and whales will dive down to feed, but don't stay in this zone permanently."
Peso smiled reminiscently. He had enjoyed his adventure in the midnight zone when he'd met the vampire squid.
"However," said Shellington, "the sunlight zone, the twilight zone, and the midnight zone are…well, I suppose you can call them nicknames for these regions. Scientists have different terms for them."
He pressed a button and the screen behind him came to life.
"I'm going to give you some terminology," he said. "When you speak with fellow oceanographers, they will probably use scientific terms, so it's important that you know them yourself.
First off, the water column is also called the pelagic zone. In this instance, the word zone refers to a vertical column of water, not the horizontal bands that are the sunlight, twilight and midnight zones.
The word pelagic comes from the Greek. A lot of our scientific words come from Greek and Latin. In Greek, pelagic means 'open sea.'
The scientific term for the sunlight zone is Epipelagic. It's also called the Euphotic Zone. Remember that photic, and photo, mean sunlight."
His audience wrote down this information.
"The scientific term for the twilight zone is Mesopelagic. Meso means 'middle' in Greek.
And finally, the scientific term for the midnight zone is bathypelagic. Bathy is Greek for 'deep.'"
Behind him on the screen, the terms for the pelagic zone appeared.
"Now, the midnight zone is divided into three zones themselves," continued Shellington, "but I think this is enough for our first lesson. Does anybody have any questions?"
"Have these terms always been used in oceanography, Shellington?" asked Captain Barnacles.
"No, Captain. It wasn't until the 1930s and 1940s that these words were 'coined.' To 'coin' a word means to invent it, Vegimals. When a serious study of the oceans began in the 1930s, scientists had to come up with names and they chose names from Greek and Latin. All the scientists had to agree on each name and what it defined. Actually, the history of oceanography is as interesting as the science of oceanography itself."
Shellington took five pieces of paper from the lectern.
"Vegimals," he said, "here is a coloring page for you. It illustrates the water column….or…what?"
"Pela zona," chirped Grouber.
"The pelagic zone, right," agreed Shellington. "You see, it's divided into three zones – the epipelagic zone, the mesopelagic zone, and the bathypelagic zone, and for each zone there are some illustrations of the creatures that live most of their lives in that particular zone."
Each Vegimal took their coloring page from Shellington, saying, "Thank you."
"Didn't you make a coloring page for the rest of us?" asked Kwazi.
Shellington smiled.
"Why, yes, Kwazii, I did. I made six extra copies – they are here on this lectern if anyone else would like to take one."
Barnacles stood up.
"Thank you, Shellington. An interesting first lesson. Dashi, shall we take the Octopod up to the Euphotic zone, I mean the epipelagic zone, and do some bird watching?"
"I'm on it, Captain!" said Dashi.