sea cucumber

[chowders]

what has the highest water content - a cucumber or sea water?

[bednobs]

hmm i would say there are probably billions and billions of litres of water in the sea, so i'm going to have to plump for the sea

[shammydodger]

Bednobs

I would've thought the question is considering the percentage content. So, if you had 1kg of sea water and 1kg of cucumber, which would contain more water?

[shammydodger]

Cucumbers are approx 96% water. Sea water tends to have a salt content of about 3.5%, then there are the other things in it such as microorganisms. It is probably a close-run thing.

[theprof]

As shammydodger says, a cucumber is 96% water.

The total dissolved solids in seawater amount to about 3.5%, the greatest constituent being salt - ocean water contains about 31% sodium, which is equivalent to about 79% sodium chloride (salt). It's as well to remember that salinity varies throughout the world's oceans at any one time due to ocean currents, evaporation, inflow of fresh water, snow etc.

In addition, some areas of the ocean are low in salt such as the western pacific seaboard of the USA and the Polar Regions.

Seawater also contains varying amounts of undissolved insoluble particles, organic material, microorganisms etc. which again varies from place to place.

When all these factors are taken into consideration, it's likely that a cucumber has a marginally higher percentage of water in a given mass than seawater, although as shammydodger says, it could be a close run thing.

[stevie21]

What if the sea cucumber is in sea water and the 96% water that it is composed of is saltwater? Then it'd be 95.9% of 96% to get the H2O content...

[theprof]

Ah well, now you're talking.

I'll accept that question title is "sea cucumber" which could be interpreted as referring to the echinoderm animal species commonly known as the sea slug.

However, the question itself refers to "a cucumber" and both shammydodger and myself have concluded that the poster was refering to the garden cucumber, Cucumis sativa.

So, are you talking about the sea cucumber echinoderm stevie21 or a vegetable cucumber lying forlorn on the seabed?

[theprof]

On second thoughts, perhaps Spongebob Squarepants will keep the cucumber company!

[kuhugaq]

put your cucumber in the sea ,if it sinks it wins

[f03nix]

I like cucumbers, I stick them up my arrrr...

[kuhugaq]

ahh!! f03nix "the imposter" ,dare say fo3nix will not be impressed with your crudeness

[f03nix]

do you honestly think I give a .......