Remember the headlines last month about a newly discovered “octopus garden“?
They were talking about this:
This garden isn’t in the shade; it’s located on the warmest thing around — an underwater volcanic landform that still releases heat, although it hasn’t erupted in almost ten million years.
A good thing for octopuses and other living beings in the area!
This is from an Indian Ocean hotspot documentary. Davidson Seamount is not a result of hotspot volcanism, as far as I know, but the basic processes described here that build undersea volcanoes are the same everywhere.
See how that island draws in life — the birds, the greenery!
Well, when a submarine volcano’s fires have died down, the mountainous structure attracts and supports ocean life, too:
Lagniappe:
Meanwhile, in the abyss…
This one comes with a bit of a jargon alert, but please don’t let that faze you. The videography is superb, and it does take us back to Precambrian basics: very simple organisms living directly off Earth’s volcanism at hydrothermal vents.
Featured image: A 400-mile-long chain of undersea volcanoes in the Gulf of Alaska. (Image: NOAA via Wikimedia, public domain).
Flight To Wonder 
