World's Largest Fish Nesting Ground With 60 Million Nests Discovered Under Antarctic Ice (Pics & Video)

The unexpected find is way larger than any other known colony of fish nests found so far. The fact that we know less about the ocean floor than we do about the surface of the Moon doesn’t make this incredible find any less surprising. Five hundred meters below the ice covering the south of Antarctica’s Weddell Sea, a research team recently discovered the world’s largest fish breeding site known to date.

"Considering how little known the Antarctic Weddell Sea is, this underlines all the more the need of international efforts to establish a Marine Protected Area (MPA)," said AWI Director and deep-sea biologist Professor Antje Boetius, who took part in developing non-invasive technology that to allowed the team to observe the ecosystem without disturbing it. "Unfortunately, the Weddell Sea MPA has still not yet been adopted unanimously by CCAMLR. But now that the location of this extraordinary breeding colony is known, Germany and other CCAMLR members should ensure that no fishing and only non-invasive research takes place there in future." Image credit: Alfred Wegener Institute, PS124 OFOBS Team