Thousands of miles of emptiness. Nothing but blue, grey, green and white. Giant waves, shrieking gales, water so cold. This is what millions of people in history had to cross in order to begin new lives. Witnessing the greatest migration of peoples in history as well as the longest and most bitterly fought of all naval battles it connects two hitherto unknown continents. There is perhaps no stretch of water quite as forbidding, no stretch so important to human history as this one. This is the story of the North Atlantic.
Oceans
Deep Oceans – Abyssal Plains, Trenches and their Bizarre Life
Oceanography – the nature of the vast oceans and their ecosystems. The largest of the world’s biomes is the one we know the least of. Crushing pressures and the vast extent of the abyssal plains of the oceans mean we know more about the surface of the moon than the depths below the water. What we do know, however, is life here has evolved into an almost alien-like form that differs greatly from that of the surface. Join me in this final episode of the Biomes series, as I investigate the nature of the deep oceans and their bizarre ecosystems.
Shallow Seas – Continental Shelf, Coral, Plankton and Kelp
Coral Reefs, seaweed, kelp and plankton. Just a handful of lifeforms that we find in waters where light can reach, where plankton can photosynthesise, and for a complex array of plants and animals to build upon that in a food chain. In this video, I explore the origins of Earth’s seas, continental shelfs, and how life has developed within this biome.