Abstract
II. 4. FOOD.—The late Prof. Sars, in his remarks on the distribution of animals in the depths of the sea, asks “Whence do animals that live at depths far below the limits of vegetation obtain their food?” Bronn, Wallich, Wyville Thomson, and others have endeavoured to answer this question; but I do not think the problem has yet been satisfactorily solved. A considerable quantity of vegetable food is undoubtedly supplied from the Sargasso Sea and a similar area in the Pacific Ocean, as well as by the sea-weeds which fringe every coast. But this supply is not sufficient for the indirect support of the countless host of animals that inhabit the depths of the ocean, all of which are necessarily zoophagous or subsist on other animals. Plant life, except perhaps one of a peculiar kind, which will be presently noticed, appears to be absent in depths exceeding 150 fathoms.
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References
See Proc. Roy. Soc. 1870, p. 420.
Journal of the Linnean Society, vol. ix. p. 147.
Proc. Roy. Soc. vol. xxiii. p 34.
Ibid. p. 235.
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Deep-Sea Exploration 1 . Nature 23, 324–326 (1881). https://doi.org/10.1038/023324a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/023324a0