On the move

  

 

Eric photographed this beautiful Opalescent Nudibranch (Hermissenda opalescens) wandering through a world of pastel colors on 29 January 2025. 

 

In the background: the pale pink is a crustose coralline algae, the bright pink is a Derby Hat Bryozoan (Integripelta bilabiata), and the peach is another species of bryozoan (unidentified species).

Time for owls

  

Some of you might remember that I sometimes see owls in pieces of sea urchin test.  Here's one perched on a branch of coralline algae.  :)  From 8 June 2024.  Do you see an owl, too?

P.S.  For more "urchin owls," see the post called "Duetting" on 11 March 2013.

A chiton with flair

  

Eric snapped this great photo of a Veiled Chiton (Placiphorella velata) during field work this afternoon (8 March 2024).  Impressive how well this species looks like the surrounding habitat — rock, coralline algae, and red seaweeds.  This individual even has a little bit of branching coralline algae growing on its shell plates!  

Here's another image from a little farther back:

 

 

For more information about this intriguing predatory chiton, you can review the post called "A veiled threat" from 21 August 2012.  And there's a beautiful underwater photo in the post called "Camouflaged like coralline" on 11 August 2021.

In the zones

  

This morning (24 April 2023) we were finishing some surveys at a site with lots of wave splash.  In this case that means the intertidal zonation is clearly demarcated and the zones extend very high on the rocks.  

For example, on the left, the brownish coloration is made up of seaweeds (primarily Pyropia and Pelvetiopsis), the dark blue areas are California Mussels (Mytilus californianus), and below that is a band of surfgrass (Phyllospadix scouleri) and coralline algae (some of it is bleached, likely by warm or desiccating conditions, so it's paler than usual).

In this view there was also a nice flock of Surfbirds (Calidris virgata) foraging in the zone above the mussels.

Isopod and friends

  

We've been busy doing surveys in the field during the low tides recently, but here's an isopod photo from back in February -- a Blunt-tailed Isopod (Idotea urotoma) photographed in the low intertidal zone.  

Among other things in the photo, you can see pale pink crustose coralline algae, a small iridescent snail, Lirularia sp., and a darker pink and red bryozoan (Integripelta bilabiata, formerly Eurystomella).

What fish?

 

We were exploring a rocky intertidal zone site near Carmel this morning when I looked down to see (or not see?) this sculpin with amazing camouflage colors.  It looked just like the surrounding pink crustose coralline algae and the green Aggregating Sea Anemones (Anthopleura elegantissima).

I tried to get a view from the side.  What beautiful fins!

 

Here's one even closer:

 

 

And you know me, I can't resist sculpin eyes:

 

Little green marbles

 

I encountered a small patch of Derbesia marina after field work in Oregon this morning — a fun seaweed sometimes called Green Sea Grape.  It looks like little green marbles (or miniature glass fishing floats?).  [Each "bubble" is less than 10 mm across.]

Here are two more views:

 

 

Derbesia marina is often found fairly low in the intertidal zone emerging from coralline algae (the encrusting pink algae in the background).

I haven't seen Derbesia on Bodega Head that often, but here's one example from 2010:

 

Hail 2 March

We were driving to work this morning when it started to hail.  I haven't seen hail very often in Bodega Bay, so I was pretty excited.  I asked Eric to pull over so I could take a few pictures.  I tried recording a short video (see below).  And then, since the hail wasn't melting very fast, I went down to the beach to photograph the hail on the sand for the record.  [If you can't see the video below, click on the title of this post to go to the website.]

Hail 2 March 2018 from Jackie Sones on Vimeo.

I think I've only seen this once or twice in the last 10 years or so — hailstones being pushed up into a drift line by the waves:

 

Most of the hailstones were ~4 mm across:

 

Next, here's a series of photos with marine flora and fauna for context.

With coralline algae (bleached by the sun):

 

With snail egg capules:  

 

With a small sea urchin spine:

 

With a springtail (collembolid) on a hailstone (upper left corner)!

 

A perfect match

 

A few days ago, Eric spotted this wonderful sculpin in the rocky intertidal zone.

I haven't learned how to identify the different species of intertidal sculpins yet, but this one is too beautiful not to share, even though I'm not sure which species it is.

Here's a close-up — note the mottled pink splotches on the body and the fins that appear to mimic coralline algae:

 

The camouflage is especially striking when the sculpin is viewed among the coralline algae growing on the rocks:

 

Mendocino scenes

A couple of seascapes from the Mendocino coast yesterday (10 June 2016):

 

A breezy morning, with Sea Palms (Postelsia palmaeformis) in the foreground.

 

 

Sea urchins (purple), sea anemones (green), and coralline algae (pink) under water on a vertical wall along a deep surge channel.

Anemones & friends

Just back from a meeting in Monterey, CA, but we were able to take a quick field trip to the Big Sur coast this afternoon before heading north.

This shallow tidepool offered an especially nice view of Giant Green Anemones (Anthopleura xanthogrammica), Purple Sea Urchins (Strongylocentrotus purpuratus) of various sizes, and a few species of pink coralline algae.  There's also a tiny bit of bright orange sponge (below the large anemone).  And if you look closely, the small dark holes scattered around the urchins belong to a colonial tubeworm (Dodecaceria sp.).

Zigzags and blotches

 

Lined Chiton (Tonicella lineata) with coralline algae.  Photographed near Mendocino, CA, 28 October 2012

While the eye-catching zigzag markings are distinctive in this species, the dark maroon blotches are variable.  I don't recall reading anything about why some individuals have blotches and others don't.  Any ideas?