Down there, it’s completely dark – too far down for sunlight to reach – and extremely cold.
Not the ideal spot for life to, uh… find a way.
But when they lowered some recording equipment, they were surprised to find the river was full amphipods.
The shrimplike crustaceans flittered about the place, illuminated only by the camera lights.
A world of amphipods hidden beneath the ice.
We were inundated."
But other recording runs in the river turned up far fewer creatures.
This variability, he notes, is “part of the excitement.”
But once you crack through that formidable barrier, endless bounties await.
A similar question arises for the amphipods discovered beneath Ross.
“What is supplying the nutrients?”
said Stevens, adding “that’s probably the thing intriguing us most about this.”
It’s a pertinent time to be discovering never-before-seen hotspots of Antarctic life and asking these types of questions.
