From the tidepool to the stars

A few weeks ago I went out to Franklin Point and saw that the sea lettuces (Ulva sp.) were spawning in the high pools. I revisited the site today, with a lower tide to work with, and spent a considerable amount of time looking for and photographing the staurozoans. I did find some, too! But they are not the focus of this post.

As the tide came back in, I spent more time working my way through the higher pools. At Franklin Point there are very few places where the water is still. Even in the high regions the intertidal terrain is more surge channels than pools. But if you go high enough up the beach there are some quiet areas where the water, if it moves, does so very slowly. It is in these areas where the algal spawn forms those beautiful patterns that I photographed at the beginning of the month. Today there was much less algal spawn accumulating in the calm areas. It was also windy (and cold) this morning, so the patterns were not as crisp as they had been in early April. Still pretty, though!

On my way back up the beach I saw something that looked like an iceberg viewed from the air.

This is an accumulation of foam being pushed ashore. I didn’t have any way to collect a sample to bring back to the lab for closer observation, but foams like this are usually due to algal particulates. Surface agitation whips up the organic matter, which act as surfactants and produce tiny bubbles. I’d be willing to bet that the Ulva spawn is at least partly responsible for this foam.

I watched the foam for several minutes, and was rewarded for my vigilance. I found an area where the highest reach of the incoming tide was gently washing back and forth.

I found the slow swirling to be rather mesmerizing. Maybe that was due to the early morning, the brisk sea air, or hunger pangs. But when I saw this I thought to myself, “I’ve seen that somewhere before.” You might be able to guess where.

To validate my intuition, when I got home I looked up some images and found that I was sort of right after all.

Okay, so maybe the resemblance isn’t as strong as all that. But I can still imagine the streams in van Gogh’s painting swirling and flowing the way the algal foam does. What do you think?