Sea Pigs Research Paper

855 Words4 Pages
Sea Pigs Every once in awhile there is a creature under the sea that resembles a creature on land, and the Sea Pig is one. Surely everyone in this class has seen a pig in real life, if so then just imagine a pig underwater with a jelly looking body, tentacles around its mouth, and five to seven legs/feet. The biggest a Sea Pig gets is 12 cm and maybe 15 cm but that's very rare, they are about the right size to fit in the palm of your hand. The Sea Pig isn't rare but it’s not commonly seen because Sea Pigs live on the seafloor and it is very hard for people to see them, unless they go trawling. The Sea Pigs characteristics are what make it unique. First off we will be talking about the Sea Pigs description and basic information. “Sea Pigs…show more content…
a whale corpse. Sea Pigs are known as deposit or detrital feeders, they mainly eat decaying plants or dead animals/animal feces (marine snow). The papillae on top of their body help the Sea Pigs smell out/find food. The tentacles around their mouth are for going through mud and picking out food (Bates). Sea Pigs mainly use their sense of smell to detect food, this is why they are commonly found facing toward the current (strange animals). You might think that the Sea Pigs do not have many enemies/threats because they are on the ocean floor, and you’re right! The biggest threat that the sea pigs have would be deep sea trawling, the average trawl catches and kills 300 to 600 sea pigs. In Japan sea pigs are trawled for food, and the Japanese consume sea pigs at an alarming rate, in Japan sea pigs are considered a delicacy. Funny fact, supposedly sea pigs taste like chicken (crazy creature of the week: the sea pig). Some other enemies would be Gastropods and Small Tanaids, the snails make small holes in the body and suck on their juices, while the small tanaids drill small holes and feed on their internal organs (Strange

More about Sea Pigs Research Paper

Open Document