One of the important distinctions that my marine biology students learn about is the difference between organisms that are benthic and those that are pelagic. Organisms described as benthic live attached to or associated with a surface, often but not always the sea floor. In addition to the stationary sea floor itself, benthic organisms can…
Tag: rocky intertidal
A different perspective
Yesterday I had the great fortune to visit a new intertidal site. It can be accessed only by crossing private property. The property owner is my next-door neighbor, and he said I can visit any time. As I said, lucky me! The site is a little north of Pigeon Point, and at first glance the…
Rock stars
Some organisms, like some people, have a charisma that just can’t be explained. For me, the sea palm (Postelsia palmiformis) has always been one such organism. Maybe part of its charm is the fact that it’s not very common; it lives on rocky outcrops on exposed outer coasts, which aren’t the easiest places to get…
To the stars and back again
Dedication: For Krinkle, because I think he’d appreciate the juxtaposition This is one of my favorite quotations from literature: And it is a strange thing that most of the feeling we call religious, most of the mystical outcrying which is one of the most prized and used and desired reactions of our species, is really…
Earthwatch 2: Project ASCO
One of the reasons I selected this particular Earthwatch expedition was that it involved studies of both forest and ocean, which are my two favorite ecosystems here at home. I wanted to compare what I’m familiar with to similar habitats on the opposite coast. Regarding the rocky intertidal, I had been warned not to expect…
A most unusual sort of snail
One of the many delightful animals in the rocky intertidal is the vermetid snail, Thylacodes squamigerus. Unlike their more typical gastropod relations, the vermetids don’t live in a shell, per se. Instead, they live in a calcareous tube, which forms a loose coil draped over the surface of a rock. The tubes can be up…
Natural Bridges
Last week we had some of the best low tides of the season, and I was grateful to spend three consecutive mornings in the intertidal. The picture-taking conditions were fantastic when I went to Natural Bridges, and I snapped away like a madwoman. Unfortunately, last week was also finals week, and it wasn’t until I…
When things are just a little too swell
One of the things that I’ve been doing with my Ecology class since almost the very beginning is LiMPETS monitoring in the rocky intertidal. Usually we have a classroom training session before meeting in the field to do the actual work. This year we are teaching the class in a hybrid mode, with lecture material…
Glow
On this winter solstice, as we anticipate the return of light, I thought I’d write about a different kind of light. Merriam-Webster defines fluorescence as “luminescence that is caused by the absorption of radiation at one wavelength followed by nearly immediate reradiation usually at a different wavelength and that ceases almost at once when the…
Ready for battle
For some reason, many of the sunburst anemones (Anthopleura sola) in a certain area at Davenport Landing were geared up for a fight. I don’t know what was going on before I got there yesterday morning, but something got these flowers all riled up. We think of them as being placid animals, but that’s only…