Early morning low tides are the best

This morning I went on a solo trip to one of my favorite intertidal sites up the coast a bit. I’ve been busy with stuff at the marine lab and my house is a construction zone this summer so it was really nice being alone in nature for a couple of hours before most people had gotten out of bed.

I didn’t find what I was looking for but did see some great stuff that I wasn’t looking for, which is just as rewarding.

The approach to the beach over the dunes is always spectacular even on a gloomy morning. I find this color palette very soothing.

The site itself is rocky with a sandy bottom. Depending on the severity of recent storm action there can be more or less sand. Winter storms wash sand away, while in the summer the sand tends to accumulate and can bury the rocks to surprising depths.

It may be an optical illusion, but when I’m scrunched down in amongst the rocks it appears that the waves are breaking at heights quite a bit above my head. Most of the water’s force is dissipated as the waves wash over the rocks, and unless I’ve wandered out too far, by the time it gets to me all I need to worry about is whether the surge will overtop my boots. Which has indeed happened and makes for a cold squelchy morning.

---

And now for some happy snaps!

Because, really, doesn’t everybody have a favorite red alga? This is mine. It presses gorgeously and is so damn beautiful!

---

At one point I saw a worm-like thing thrashing around in a shallow pool. Turns out it was a polychaete worm, probably in the genus Nereis, doing epic battle with a predatory nemertean worm (Paranemertes peregrina). By the time I figured out what was going on and stuck my camera in the water the interaction had more of less come to an end. The polychaete did get away without apparent damage, but it was moving pretty slowly afterward. In this video Nereis is the segmented worm that’s doing all the wiggling, and Paranemertes is the purple and beige unsegmented worm that you can sort of make out in the top of the frame. I wish I had been swifter on the uptake with the camera.

---

And the pièce de résistance for this trip:  A little sea hare! This guy was so small (about 2.5 cm long) that at first I thought it was a clump of red algae. Then I saw the little rhinophores (those ear-like projections that give them their common name) and recognized it as a sea hare. Amazingly cute!

I was lucky enough to capture some video of this critter crawling around.

Aside from the rhinophores it doesn’t look hare-like at all, does it? I wonder about common names sometimes.

All in all, it was a great morning. An early morning low tide is the best reason I can think of to crawl out of bed at 04:30!