The smoke from the cooking stove rose up with a fragrant smell that made many people on the boat swallow their saliva involuntarily.
Perhaps because of the fragrance, many seabirds were attracted around the fishing boat. However, perhaps out of fear of the fierceness of the Steller's sea eagle, those seabirds did not dare to land on the deck and only fluttered around the fishing boat.
On the contrary, there were quite a few fish in the sea water that swam towards the boat.
Xiang Yang even saw a group of big guys.
It was a herd of walruses.
"There are so many walruses in Antarctica." Fang Youqun said in surprise while pointing in one direction while eating grilled squid.
In the direction that Fang Youqun pointed, a large group of walruses were thrashing in the sea.
They have large bodies and their skin appears thick and has many wrinkles.
Xiang Yang has very good eyesight and can see that the walruses have sparse bristles on their skin.
Xiang Yang smiled and said, "There are only a few dozen walruses here. They can only be considered the smallest group in the walrus family."
Walruses, like elephants, live in groups.
An explorer once took a picture of tens of thousands of walruses gathered on the beach of a deserted island. The scene really was a gathering of walruses that seemed endless.
"These walruses are so ugly. They have such long teeth, but short noses, and no ear shells. They look much uglier than sea lions." Fang Youqun said with disgust.
Xiang Yang smiled and said nothing.
If we talk about appearance, walruses are naturally not as good-looking as elephants on land.
Elephants on land have fat heads and big ears, limbs like pillars, and a long nose.
Walruses are different. Their limbs have degenerated into fins to adapt to life in water. Although this allows them to swim faster in the ocean, it prevents them from walking on land like elephants.
Walruses can generally only move in the ocean and on ice.
When on ice, walruses can crawl on the ice by bending their hind flippers forward and piercing their tusks into the ice.
"No more looking at it, no more looking at it. These things are too ugly. Looking at them any longer will affect my appetite." Fang Youqun turned his head and said.
Xiang Yang burst into laughter when he heard this. "The walrus does look ugly, but it shouldn't affect your appetite, right?"
"Why not? Look at those guys, rolling in the sea like pigs in a pigsty." Fang Youqun said with a look of disgust.
"Huh?"
As he was talking, Fang Youqun suddenly stopped, looked at the walruses with shining eyes, and asked, "Brother Yang, I remember that ivory is very valuable. Do you think these walrus teeth are valuable?"
Xiang Yang shook his head. "You think too much. Elephant tusks are considered gems. The teeth of the sea tusks are too rough and are not worth mentioning compared to ivory. Otherwise, how can we see so many walruses on the sea now?"
When Fang Youqun heard this, he immediately lost all interest in these walruses.
"It's so ugly and not worth any money. I won't look at it anymore. I won't look at it anymore. I really won't be able to eat if I look at it again." Fang Youqun muttered.
Xiang Yang narrowed his eyes and continued to look at the walruses.
The walruses were still some distance away from the fishing boats. Their eyesight was very poor, almost like they were blind.
Even such a large fishing boat may not be visible to them.
But walruses have a very keen sense of smell.
Xiang Yang was certain that the walruses must have come here because of the smell of barbecue, but they might have been frightened by the huge creatures like fishing boats, so they did not dare to approach the fishing boats.
Speaking of which, these walruses are quite lucky. In Antarctica, they are almost at the top of the food chain. Because of their ugly appearance and worthlessness, even fishermen are unwilling to catch them.
Walruses living in the Arctic are not so lucky.
When food is scarce, polar bears often turn their attention to walruses.
Every year, a large number of walruses are killed by polar bears.
Suddenly, Xiang Yang discovered that the walruses were in a panic, paddling their fins desperately and swimming away.
"Huh? The walrus actually ran away. Could it be that a killer whale came?" Xiang Yang asked puzzledly.
Walruses have thick skin and flesh. In the entire Antarctic, the only creature that can bite a walrus to death is almost always the killer whale.
Apart from killer whales, even leopard seals would find it difficult to bite a walrus to death.
However, killer whales generally do not hunt walruses.
It’s not that walruses are weak in combat, orcas will get hurt when they kill walruses.
But walruses are very timid marine creatures. Once they encounter killer whales, they will try their best to escape and quickly climb onto the ice.
Killer whales cannot climb onto ice, so they have no way of dealing with walruses.
"There are no obvious waves on the sea, so it shouldn't be a killer whale." Wu Shiwen, who came to Xiang Yang's boat to eat and drink, stood up and said.
Xiang Yang smiled and said, "That's not necessarily true. If the killer whale attacks from below the sea surface, even if there are waves, they are below the seabed and you can't see them. Hey, what is that thing?"
"It's a jellyfish sting." Wu Shiwen said with a very serious expression.
The stinging jellyfish is also a very dangerous jellyfish. Its appearance is transparent and looks like a crystal ball. In fact, its toxins are very strong. An adult man only needs to touch it once to feel the pain worse than death.
If someone encounters a stinging jellyfish in the sea, they will often faint from the pain and then drown in the sea.
"What's there to be afraid of? We've even caught box jellyfish before. Are you afraid of being stung by jellyfish? Let's continue drinking and barbecuing." Chen Qingsheng pulled Wu Shiwen's wrist and motioned for him to sit down.
"No matter what kind of jellyfish it is, as long as we don't go under the water, they can't do anything to us." Xiang Yang also said with a smile.
After thinking for a while, Xiang Yang said, "We don't have to be afraid even if we are underwater. Although the diving suits on our boat can't withstand the bites of hammerhead sharks, they are not afraid of the toxins of jellyfish."
After listening to this, Wu Shiwen slowly sat down again, but it was obvious that he was now uneasy, and he kept glancing at the sea out of the corner of his eyes.
"How could there be so many jellyfish here? Look, from the floating ice over there to the waves over here, they are visible and invisible. There are jellyfish everywhere. There must be tens of thousands of them." Wu Shiwen said.
Xiang Yang smiled and said, "The biggest natural enemy of jellyfish is sea turtles. In Antarctica, except for special sea turtles like leatherback sea turtles, there are almost no sea turtles. Without natural enemies and with plenty of food, isn't it easy for them to reproduce?"
Wu Shiwen nodded thoughtfully after hearing this, "That's right. Plus, there are few traces of human activity in Antarctica, and no one deliberately salvages them, so it's easy for them to multiply."