This morning I drove up the coast to Pigeon Point. It was cold and very windy, and I was grateful to have decided to wear all of my layers. I don’t remember any cold mornings from last year’s low tides, which made me think that perhaps we’re returning to a more normal non-El Niño weather pattern. The…
Tag: marine invertebrates
A little less confounded now
So. Last week when I looked at my sand dollar larvae I wasn’t at all sure what to make of them. I thought that all of the offspring from one of the matings (F2xM1) were going south and didn’t know how much longer they would survive. The offspring from the other two matings seemed to be…
Confounded
Remember that one batch of sand dollar larvae that were looking weird on Monday? Well, they still look weird. In fact, all of the larvae looked the same yesterday as they did on Monday, which seems strange, considering how quickly they galloped through development for the first three weeks of larval life. It’s as though they’ve…
Sexy time for sea anemones
This morning I went out on the first morning low tide of the season. I was so excited to have the morning lows back that I got to the site early and had to wait for the sun to come up. Awesome thing #1 about early morning low tides: Having the intertidal to myself. The purpose for…
Still on the fast track
Because I was so surprised at how quickly my sand dollar larvae (Dendraster excentricus) were developing, I checked my notebook from the invertebrate embryology course I took while in grad school to see if what I’m observing now is normal for these animals. It turns out that yes, Dendraster does develop at a much quicker rate than its cousin the…
A new obsession
This afternoon I met up with Joanna and Amy, who had come to the marine lab with some sand dollars (Dendraster excentricus) to try to spawn. Since sand dollars are in the same taxonomic group (the Echinoidea) as sea urchins, I’d try the same techniques on these animals I’d never spawned before. I did have to…
Seeing (wannabe) stars
So. I have a batch of larvae from a spontaneous spawning of the leather star, Dermasterias imbricata, that occurred four weeks ago tonight. Until now I’ve never had an opportunity to work with this species, even though we have quite a few of them at the marine lab. I had my own for several years, until…
Swimming jellybeans
When serendipity strikes, I try to go with the flow and ride it as long as I can. The latest wave is my batch of Dermasterias larvae, which are developing nicely for the first four days of life. And now they look just like jellybeans! They have complete guts now and have already grown a bit,…
Serendipity strikes again
Actually, it was a fortunately placed phone call from an aquarium curator that struck the other night. I was at home, having eaten dinner and reviewed my lecture for the following morning, when my phone rang. It was the curator, saying that he was making his last rounds of the evening and had noticed that some…
All anemones, all the time
While much of America was glued to the television watching a football game, I went out to the intertidal at Davenport Landing to do some collecting and escape from Super Bowl mania. The Seymour Center and I have a standing agreement that some animals–small hermit crabs and certain turban snails, for example–are always welcome, which gave…