12-Feb Toothfish
Fortunately, it is calm today but storms whip up very quickly down here. We are very far south in the bottom of the Ross Sea – almost as close as possible by sea to the South Pole.
We are steaming off to our next station at the moment. We should get there about 2000 hours then - nets over the side and we do it all again, multi corers taking bed samples and midwater trawl samples. All quite interesting stuff really with all sorts of samples of sea life coming on board. How the hell anything would want to live in these frigid conditions, I will never know or understand.
We caught a huge tooth fish, 32 kilograms, I think, and about 1.3 meters long. The scientists took it down to their lab and dissected it in order to find out how it prefers to dine. They found some nice sized squid and ice fish. Toothfish are also known as Antarctic Cod to Americans and is famous for producing antifreeze glycoprotein that allows it to survive in the ice-laden waters sourounding Antarctica. It has a heartbeat of once every six seconds and research may lead to advances in cardiac medicine involving conditions where human hearts beat slowly during certain medical procedures or fail to beat fast enough due to hypothermia.
The tooth fish has been carved up by the scientists in the fish lab and delivered to the galley. Bryan, the cook, gets all excited and starts thinking about how many different ways he can serve it up over the next few days or so.
On the menu today is TnT - (Toothfish smoked in Tealeaves). It is a very oily fish with a strong taste - very high in Omega 3 apparently so must be good – I try hard to like it.
Fortunately, it is calm today but storms whip up very quickly down here. We are very far south in the bottom of the Ross Sea – almost as close as possible by sea to the South Pole.
We are steaming off to our next station at the moment. We should get there about 2000 hours then - nets over the side and we do it all again, multi corers taking bed samples and midwater trawl samples. All quite interesting stuff really with all sorts of samples of sea life coming on board. How the hell anything would want to live in these frigid conditions, I will never know or understand.
We caught a huge tooth fish, 32 kilograms, I think, and about 1.3 meters long. The scientists took it down to their lab and dissected it in order to find out how it prefers to dine. They found some nice sized squid and ice fish. Toothfish are also known as Antarctic Cod to Americans and is famous for producing antifreeze glycoprotein that allows it to survive in the ice-laden waters sourounding Antarctica. It has a heartbeat of once every six seconds and research may lead to advances in cardiac medicine involving conditions where human hearts beat slowly during certain medical procedures or fail to beat fast enough due to hypothermia.
The tooth fish has been carved up by the scientists in the fish lab and delivered to the galley. Bryan, the cook, gets all excited and starts thinking about how many different ways he can serve it up over the next few days or so.
On the menu today is TnT - (Toothfish smoked in Tealeaves). It is a very oily fish with a strong taste - very high in Omega 3 apparently so must be good – I try hard to like it.
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