Zoo+Plankton

//    Meganyctiphones norvegica      //

If a copepod, a type of zooplankton, were the size of a cheetah, it would be able to run over 2000 miles an hour!! That’s the distance from Pennsylvania to California! Zooplanktons are protists that are essential to water ecosystems. They are so important because they are a food source for many other ocean animals. If there were no zooplankton, everything else would have nothing to eat. They are the base of the ocean food chain. Zooplanktons are a part of the Protista kingdom. Protists are organisms that do not belong to any other kingdom. Although most protists are unicellular (meaning one cell) zooplankton can be either. Some protists have cell walls, but protists such as zooplankton do not. They are eukaryotic meaning that they have a nucleus. Zooplankton is the animal form of plankton. Their main sources of food are bacteria and phytoplankton. They have most of the characteristics that animals have. They can move and they get their food from other organisms. They cannot swim; they float with the currents and the wind. They must be near the surface of the water because they need to be near the sun, because they can photosynthesize. The protist kingdom was very fun and interesting to learn about. Chris, Sami, Lauren Period 5