Concerning Sea Monkeys

Okay, Christen, just for you.

When I was young, I convinced my mother to buy me a Sea Monkeys set, probably because my friend Jake had them. I don't really remember much about the experience, except that mine were never as big as his and had a disappointing tendency to die. And despite the claim of the Sea Monkeys website that their name is due to their playful, monkey-like behavior, they were boring as hell.

Still, sure that there was a way to make them more fun, I pored over (not "poured over") the accessories catalog, assuring my mother that it was absolutely crucial that my sea monkeys have not only a five-star luxury aquarium, but also their own racetrack. Fortunately my mom is the type to cap her son's allowance at $10 and suggest used mattresses, so there was no budging her.

It has been brought to my attention recently that sea monkeys are neither monkeys, nor from the sea. Both points are correct. "Sea Monkey" is actually a patented, genetically engineered variation of Artemia salina, or brine shrimp, which is native to salt lakes and evaporation flats. Some consider Sea Monkeys to be a separate species, designated Artemia nyos, but they are incorrect--at least insofar as Artemia nyos does not fulfill the requirements of the International Code of Zoological Nominclature (I bet you didn't know that). The nyos, by the way, is not Latin, but stands for "New York Ocean Science Laboratories."

The real marketability of Sea Monkeys are their ability to be packaged and shipped in "instant hatch" formulas. This is because the brine shrimp, in some environments, enters cryptobiosis ("stasis," for the Star Trek fans among you). Sea Monkeys have been tweaked for finer control over this condition, so they may hatch more "instantly" when placed in the specially formulated water.

Both the first-day purifier packs and the second-day egg packs actually contain eggs, I guess so you'll see them sooner, and various salts which (a) allow the saltwater species to survive and (b) make them have lots and lots of sex.

Besides the instant hatching, Sea Monkeys are genetically modified to live longer and grow larger. So maybe that's the problem: Jake had sea monkeys and I, being my mother's son, had some off-brand brine shrimp.

By the way, for those of you who checked out the racetrack link... did you find that commercial as creepy as I did?