Oceana Ranger Expedition 2012 Archives

Illustrated catalogue of cold water corals (Cnidaria: Anthozoa) from Alboran basin and North Eastern Atlantic submarine mountains, collected in Oceana campaigns

Along the Oceana marine exploration trips (2011–2012) it has been collected 17 species of cold water corals (Cnidaria: Anthozoa) from deep Alboran basin and submarine mountains located South of Portugal. There are two new records from theMediterranean and also an important found regarding the enigmatic Dendrobrachia bonsai. The paper is completed by some images with … Read more

A giant foraminifer that converges to the feeding strategy of carnivorous sponges: Spiculosiphon oceana sp. nov. (Foraminifera, Astrorhizida)

Agglutinated foraminifera make a relatively diverse group of organisms, which is taxonomically defined as a subclass (Textulariia) and comprises four orders. The orders are based upon gross morphology, wall structure, and cement composition (Kaminski 2004). The cement that binds the test together may be organic (as in the Astrorhizida), calcareous and canaliculate (as in the … Read more

Last INDEMARES day in Seco de los Olivos

Yesterday afternoon we unloaded the ROV. It is now 11:00, and we’re on our way to do a few last dredges before leaving for Valencia, where the Ranger will spend the winter. At the moment it’s pretty wavy, but we’ll see if it gets a little better and we manage to gather a few more … Read more

Last ROV day in Seco de los Olivos

We dedicated most of the day to doing as many dredges as possible, but we also sent the ROV down for its last immersion after three years of work in the bank (Chella Bank, Seco de los Olivos). We sent it deep, to about -360 metres in an area that we hadn’t yet surveyed and … Read more

The Van Veen dredge

Although it was still not looking good based on the waves and currents, we headed out early to work, but this time, we used the Van Veen dredge, not the ROV. Our plan was to use the dredge to collect samples from different points around Seco de los Olivos. We got as far as 14 … Read more

Another day off

– for all of us, because although we are supposed to be working in Seco, we are dealing with 5 knot wind. It’s being difficult to document the Chella Bank (Seco de los Olivos) this year, but at least we were able to do 11 ROV immersions in the first few days of the campaign, … Read more

Unable to work

The world is upside down: we came from offshore in the Atlantic wearing short sleeves and sandals and where the ocean was almost dead calm, to arrive into the “little” Mediterranean sea, where it is so rough for October that we are forced to stay moored in Almerimar. We arrived at Seco de los Olivos … Read more

Spotting striped dolphins

Yesterday we finally had some dolphin sightings in the Gulf of Cadiz, but whales have been harder to spot. We are still trying though, and we spent the day today watching the sea. Despite the fact that the forecast was correct and fog did appear in the early hours of the morning, we managed to … Read more

Back to Seco de los Olivos

At 9:00 pm today we’ll head back to Seco after spending a few good days of work in the Gorringe. It should take about two days of sailing, during which time we expect to see whales, particularly in the Strait and the Alboran Sea, where they are usually easy spot. But for that, we’ll need … Read more

Back in Vilamoura

This afternoon we arrived in Vilamoura, dropped off the Portuguese scientists and are now preparing to leave tomorrow for the Straits of Gibraltar. The sea is looking good, so it’s possible we’ll arrive at port ahead of schedule, which would be great as we will have more time to unload, prepare everything for the next … Read more