A Bear of an Ocean Like a giant bear rambling across the northern sky is the constellation Arktos Ancient Greeks named the star group Arktos which means bear Later Arktos was changed to Arctic the name for the ocean surrounding the North Pole and the land surrounding the ocean The Arctic Ocean is almost circular and covers an area of about 5,440,000 square miles 14,089,535 square kilometers It is 13,123 feet 4,000 meters deep Unlike other oceans you can walk on this one Its ice is about 7 to 10 feet 2 to 3 meters thick and covers the water most of the year In some places the ice never melts CHEWON T HIS The Arctic Ocean surrounds the North Pole In 1958 the USS Nautilus submarine surfaced through the ice proving there was not a continent under the North Pole 4
Alaska Canada ARCTIC OCEAN Russia Greenland Norway Sweden Finland The Arctic Ocean the Earth’s smallest ocean touches parts of Russia Finland Sweden Norway Greenland Canada and Alaska Summer temperatures in this ocean reach about 32 degrees Fahrenheit 0 degrees Celsius During the winter the temperature drops to 22 degrees Fahrenheit 30 degrees Celsius 5
An Arctic Food Chain sunlight phytoplankton zooplankton Phytoplankton produce food in the Arctic Ocean They are called primary producers Through photosynthesis a process using sunlight and nutrients in the water phytoplankton produce or make food This is the beginning of a food chain of eating and being eaten Zooplankton are primary consumers because they graze on phytoplankton Overlapping and interconnected food chains form food webs Food webs show the eating habits of each member of an ecosystem An ecosystem is a combination of all living organisms such as plants and animals along with non-living things like the land water and the Sun The Sun provides energy in an ecosystem 6
fish seals whales As animals eat energy is passed from one to the other The amount of energy decreases as it moves up the chain Less energy means there are fewer animals at the top levels since there is not enough food to support more of them Arctic terns eat fish Seals also eat fish In nature a food chain has many branches creating a food web 7
