Ocean Trivia

Did you know?

By

Bryan Henry

Proofreader/Archivist
Bryan has compiled a "treasure trove" of trivia facts on many subjects. He has donated this sample of his collection to OceanQuest. Please contact him for more information about his services.

The American (Maine) lobster can grow to more than 45 pounds--about as much as a four-year-old child.

Some female crabs and lobsters can mate only after molting, putting them at the mercy of the male, who can choose to either fertilize them or eat them.

The word chowder is derived from the French chaudiere, a cauldron aboard ships which fisher-men would combine their catch to make a fish stew.

Because mackerel is a fish that spoils quickly, merchants were allowed to sell it on Sundays despite blue laws in 17th-century England. Hence the phrase, "Holy Mackerel!"

The custom of serving a slice of lemon with fish originally had nothing to do with taste. It dates to the Middle Ages, when it was believed that if a fishbone was swallowed, the juice from the lemon would dissolve it.

A lobster sheds its shell, called a carapace, six to eight times before its first birthday.

Among the many sounds produced by fish are croaks, grunts, coughs, whistles and squeaks.

The roe of lobsters is called coral.

Tomalley is the lobster's liver. It turns green when cooked and is considered by some to be a delicacy.

A cull is a one-clawed lobster, usually a victim of combat.

A lobster's kidneys are in its forehead and its teeth are in its stomach.

A single cod can lay up to nine million eggs in a season, but only one egg in a million will survive to be an adult cod.

A 265-pound swordfish was once taken on rod and reel off Cuttyhunk, Massachusetts, that had a 125-pound blue shark impaled on its sword.

The Alvin, a research vessel launched in 1964 by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, was rammed by a swordfish in 1967.

The Atlantic bluefin tuna fishery is more than a thousand years old.

The oldest crab fishery in the United States is the blue crab fishery of the Chesapeake Bay area(Virginia and Maryland), dating to the early 1600s.

Of the canned tunas, the albacore is the only species allowed to be labeled "white meat" in the United States.

Chinese tradition holds that oysters can cure freckles.

Scrod is the commercial name used to market codfish that weigh less than three pounds, and the haddock (cod family) may also be known as scrod when under three pounds.

About 10 percent of the world's total fish catch is cod.

Fish farming (aquaculture) dates back to 2000 B.C. in China with the farming of carp.

Although marketed as Chilean sea bass, this fish's real name is Patagonian toothfish. It's not a true sea bass, and its name was given because of its unappealing real name.

North America is home to about 300 species of freshwater mussels, one-third of the worldwide total.

Just how vast is the Pacific Ocean? The United States could fit fully into it 18.2 times.

The right side of a boat is referred to as starboard because early astronavigators would stand on a plank (which was on the right side)to get an unobstructed view of the stars. The left is the port side because that's the side you put in on at port.

All the landmass of the earth, plus some, could fit into the Pacific Ocean.

Carrageenan, a product extracted from seaweed, is used in foods such as ice cream, peanut butter and salad dressings, and in fertilizer, toothpaste and other products.

The tongue of a blue whale weighs as much as an elephant.

The Great Lakes account for nearly 20 percent of the world's freshwater and more than 95 percent of surface freshwater for the Lower 48 states.

Polar ice contains 97 percent of the Earth's freshwater.

Shark liver oil is still used in some cosmetics.

Shark gall bladders have been used in the treatment of acne.

Female sharks have skin twice as thick as males because males like to bite during courtship.

The heart of a blue whale is the size of a compact car.

Michigan has no ocean...but has more lighthouses than any other state.

When clocking the speed of a boat in knots, you're using a unit that originated by counting actual knots in a rope--tied at 50-foot intervals--that pass every 30 seconds as the line unfurls behind a ship.

The first writing ink was made from the ink found in the body of the octopus.

Although seawater contains nearly all the elements known, six major components (chlorine, sodium, sulfate, magnesium, calcium and potassium) make up 99 percent of the salts in seawater.