In September 2004, researchers from Tokyo Sea Life Park conducted a biological survey and collection of specimens from the Arctic Ocean in Resolute, Canada. Resolute is an Inuit village with a population of 230, located in the heart of the Arctic Circle at 75 degrees north latitude and 95 degrees east longitude.

This village is the northernmost airport with a regularly scheduled flight route, located about 2,000 kilometers from the North Pole. King George Island in Antarctica, which I visited previously, is at 62 degrees south latitude, so Resolute is located even further inland (closer to the pole) than King George Island.
However, despite its northern location, King George Island boasts a wide variety of flowering plants that are not found there. This allows musk oxen and Arctic hares, which feed on these plants, as well as large carnivorous mammals such as Arctic foxes, Arctic wolves, and Polar Bear, which prey on these herbivores, to thrive in this far northern region. Incidentally, there are no terrestrial mammals at all in Antarctica.

Now, let's try diving into the ocean. It takes a lot of courage to put your face in the seawater. The seawater temperature where the drift ice floats is minus 1 degree Celsius. For a moment, you feel a shock as if you've been hit on the head with a hammer, and your cheeks and lips, which are directly in contact with the water, feel pain before losing sensation.
If you swim slowly so as not to stir up the mud on the seabed, you can see many creatures on the ocean floor. Pink and white soft corals, bright red sea cucumbers, brittle stars that cover the seabed, and sculpins hiding in their shadows. The ocean floor is surprisingly full of colorful creatures.

At Tokyo Sea Life Park, Antarctic and Arctic creatures are displayed in adjacent tanks, allowing visitors to observe and compare them side-by-side. There is no other aquarium where you can see creatures from both poles up close.

From top of photo:
• The village of Resolute, located at the back of the bay, has a population of 230.
A single yellow flower bloomed in the rocky landscape of the Arctic.
The water temperature is minus 1 degree Celsius. Diving in the Arctic is fraught with dangers such as drift ice and Polar Bear
- A type of amphipod, approximately 15 millimeters long, perched on a type of seaweed called *Tosakanori*.
- A type of sea cucumber that extends its tentacles Psolus sp.

[Toshiki Matsuyama, Research Section Tokyo Zoological Park Society]

(October 1, 2004)