28. Read the text and translate it. Benthopelagic fish

Benthopelagic fish inhabit the water just above the bottom, feeding on benthos and benthopelagic zooplankton. Most dermersal fish are benthopelagic.

They can be divided into flabby or robust body types. Flabby benthopelagic fishes are like bathopelagic fishes, they have a reduced body mass, and low metabolic rates, expending minimal energy as they lie and wait to ambush prey. An example of a flabby fish is the cusk-eel Acanthonus armatus, a predator with a huge head and a body that is 90 percent water. This fish has the largest ears (otoliths) and the smallest brain in relation to its body size of all known vertebrates.

Robust benthopelagic fish are muscular swimmers that actively cruise the bottom searching for prey. They may live around features, such as seamounts, which have strong currents. Examples are the orange roughy and Patagonian toothfish. Because these fish were once abundant, and because their robust bodies are good to eat, these fish have been commercially harvested.

Some fishes don't fit into the above classification. For example, the family of nearly blind spiderfishes, common and widely distributed, feed on benthopelagic zooplankton. Yet they are strictly benthic fish, since they stay in contact with the bottom. Their fins have long rays they use to "stand" on the bottom while they face the current and grab zooplankton as it passes by.

The deepest-living fish known, the strictly benthic Abyssobrotula galatheae, eel-like and blind, feeds on benthic invertebrates.

Pacific hagfish resting on bottom. Hagfish coat themselves and any dead fish they find with noxious slime making them inedible to other species."

The deepest point of the ocean is about 11,000 metres. Bathypelagic fishes are not normally found below 3,000 metres. The greatest depth recorded for a benthic fish is 8,370 m. It may be that extreme pressures interfere with essential enzyme functions.

Benthic fishes are likely to be found, and are more diverse, on the continental slope, where there is habitat diversity and often food supplies. About 40% of the ocean floor consists of abyssal plains, but these flat, featureless regions are covered with sediment and largely devoid of benthic life (benthos). Deep sea benthic fishes are more likely to associate with canyons or rock outcroppings among the plains, where invertebrate communities are established. Undersea mountains (seamounts) can intercept deep sea currents, and cause productive upwellings which support benthic fish. Undersea mountain ranges can separate underwater regions into different ecosystems.

Read the text again and answer the questions:

1. What are specific features of benthopelagic fish?

2. What types of benthopelagic fish do you know?

3. Where we can find benthopelagic fish?

4. What are the differences between flabby or robust body types?

5. What is the deepest living fish?

Read the text and fill in the gaps with the most suitable word: distances, predators, coast, populations, fish, plankton, fisheries, catch.

Forage fish

Small pelagic fish are usually forage fish that are hunted by larger pelagic fish and other ________. Forage fish filter feed on plankton and are usually less than 10 centimetres long. They often stay together in schools and may migrate large _________ between spawning grounds and feeding grounds. They are found particularly in upwelling regions around the northeast Atlantic, off the _______ of Japan, and off the west coasts of Africa and the Americas. Forage fish are generally short-lived, and their stocks fluctuate markedly over the years. 

Herring are found in the North Sea and the North Atlantic at depths to 200 meters. Important herring fisheries have existed in these areas for centuries. Herring of different sizes and growth rates belong to different _______, each of which have their own migration routes. When spawning, a female produces from 20,000 to 50,000 eggs. After spawning, the herrings are depleted in fat, and migrate back to feeding grounds rich in ________. Around Iceland, three separate populations of herring were traditionally fished. These stocks collapsed in the late 1960s, although two have since recovered. After the collapse, Iceland turned to capelin, which now account for about half of Iceland's total ______.

Blue whiting are found in the open ocean and above the continental slope at depths between 100 and 1000 meters. They follow vertical migrations of the zooplankton they feed on to the bottom during daytime and to the surface at night time.

Traditional ______ for anchovies and sardines have also operated in the Pacific, the Mediterranean, and the southeast Atlantic. The world annual catch of forage ____ in recent years has been around 22 million tonnes, or one quarter of the world's total catch.