Where sea pigs safely graze

摘要

The loss of a container overboard is an inconvenience for shipper, customer, and shipowner. It's more than inconvenient when the box lands on your home, particularly if you're a small, sediment-dwelling invertebrate. That is the not entirely startling conclusion reached by researchers at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) in California, published recently in Marine Pollution Bulletin. MBARI's scientists took a remotely operated underwater vehicle down to 1,2 81 m to examine a container full of tyres that was washed off Med Taipei in February 2004 and patiently counted members of each species found on and around the box.