Deep off the coast of Canada, a team of researchers have made a remarkable discovery; a bubbling underwater volcano covered with ”maybe a million” giant eggs.
Then they noticed the conical, giant eggs covering the slopes of the volatile peak, which soars to a height of 1100 metres and is located nearly 1.5-kilometres beneath the surface of the Pacific Ocean.
The volcano has been dubbed NEPDEP 58, and is one of more than 45 new seamounts mapped by the expedition.
Lead researcher, Cherisse Du Preez, a deep-sea marine biologist from Fisheries and Oceans Canada, said she was left in shock at the discovery.
She explained the eggs belong to the Pacific white skate, Bathyraja spinosissima.
“I was in disbelief when I realised the seamount top was covered in hundreds of thousands of skate eggs, maybe a million,” Du Preez told 9news.com.au.
Prior to the find, the only other known Pacific white skate nursery was in the Galapagos and only a couple dozen eggs were observed there.
”That was a big deal discovery and so I immediately recognised the significance of what we had discovered,” Du Preez said.
“But really, at that point, we had just scratched the surface of what was to come.”
Du Preez and the team then witnessed a “one-of-a-kind encounter”.
“Everyone on the vessel was giddy with excitement over the eggs, and I joked, wouldn’t it be amazing to be the first to document a Pacific white skate, or any deep-sea skate, laying an egg,” she said.
“And just like that (we saw), a large female skate ‘swoop’ to the seafloor.
“I had speculated what it’d look like when they laid, and the swoop was exactly as I’d imagined.
“We documented it all. She flew down to the seafloor and used the corals to bush up against and pull the egg. At this point, you couldn’t ask for more.
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“The behaviour was beautiful. The encounter was one-of-a-kind”.
Du Preez said the heat from the active volcano provides an ideal environment for the species to incubate their eggs, a timeframe believed to take a massive four years.
“We deployed the submersible thermometer, and that’s when we discovered the volcano was venting hydrothermal fluid, which is a rare discovery in the world and a first in Canada,” she said.
“That was it – the draw for the skates.
“Warmth is thought to accelerate incubation times and result in more successful young hatching.
“Here, in this amazing nursery ground, they are sheltered from predators by the corals and warmed by the volcano itself,
“We believe that the eggs are safe here, the juveniles grow to be strong, and the young have a better chance at survival, to grow larger, descend into the deep, and wander the open ocean.”
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The fruitful expedition wrapped in June and had been exploring the deep sea since 2017.
“This is an example of how a seamount is essential to helping populate an ocean basin,” Du Preez said.
“This is so important considering the current question of deep-sea mining of seamounts for their cobalt crust.”
The team are yet to publish their findings.
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