[Ads-l] sympagic (sea ice habitat)

[MULLINS, WILLIAM D (Bill) CIV USARMY RDECOM AMRDEC (US)]

This 1992 cite has some background, and tends to confirm Ben's suggestion about the 1977 article:

R. Horner, et al., "Ecology of sea ice biota - 1. Habitat, terminology, and methodology" _ Polar Biology_ September 1992, Volume 12, Issue 3, p. 419
"Many terms have been used to describe the sea ice biota . . .  Epontic, meaning "being on", (but sometimes defined as "out of the sea", e.g., Whitaker 1977) has been used in much of the literature since it was first suggested by Bunt and Wood (1963) for attached or nonattached diatoms found in Antarctic sea ice. However, it has also been used for organisms attached to substrates other than ice (Crosby and Wood 1959). Further, it is not a suitable term to describe motile organisms, such as foraminiferans, ciliates, copepods, and amphipods. Because organisms from both the benthos and the plankton live in the ice, descriptive terminology should be very broad (Carey 1985). We therefore strongly suggest that epontic no longer be used for ice organisms. Instead, we propose that sympagic, meaning "with ice", be used in the same context as pelagic or benthic. Sympagic has been used previously for both plants (Whitaker 1977) and animals (Carey 1985) living in or associated with sea ice and, at present, is the most appropriate term to include all these organisms (Garrison 1991)."
[note that the OED does not have an entry for epontic, but does include it in a quotation under "phytoplankton"]



> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf Of Ben Zimmer
> Sent: Sunday, April 02, 2017 10:15 PM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: sympagic (sea ice habitat)
> 
> 
> "Sympagic (habitat)" has a Wikipedia page but no entry in the OED or any other major dictionary.
> 
> ---
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sympagic_ecology
> A sympagic environment is one where water exists mostly as a solid, ice, such as a polar ice cap or glacier. Solid sea ice is permeated with
> channels filled with salty brine. These briny channels and the sea ice itself have its ecology, referred to as "sympagic ecology".
> ---
> http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2011/03/life-sea-ice
> Julia Whitty, "Life in the Sea Ice," Mother Jones, Mar. 1, 2011 Amazingly, brine inclusions support tiny but rich ecosystems of bacteria,
> viruses, unicellular algae, diatom chains, worms, and crustaceans—a near-frozen ecosystem inside a frozen world known as a sympagic
> environment (Greek syn: with; pagos: frost).
> ---
> 
> Scholarly literature suggests the word first appeared in this 1977 article:
> 
> Terence M. Whitaker (1977), "Sea Ice Habitats of Signy Island (South
> Orkneys) and Their Primary Productivity," In: George Albert Llano (ed.), Adaptations within Antarctic Ecosystems, Proceedings of the Third
> SCAR Symposium on Antarctic Biology. Smithsonian Instituhon, Washington, D.C., pp. 75-89.
> https://books.google.com/books?id=ykURAAAAYAAJ
> 
> Google Books only has it in snippet view, but it's possible to find several cites for "sympagic", e.g., "Table 1: An indication of the variety of
> sympagic habitats present in winter at the South Orkney Islands."
> 
> --bgz
> 

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