plant/animal reference) to get a bigger pictureThursday, June 5, 2008
Sunlight Beach
Rolling Hills
Rolling Hills team photo 2008 |
Charlie Seablom's Rolling Hills team was also out on June 5th. The big low pressure front that had plagued Whidbey Island beach monitors all week continued to move through and gave this team a good dousing of rain. Charlie tells us that the highlight for him was "getting home and getting dry!" He reports that he had a good crew and everything went well except for the weather. They did not make any unusual findings.
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
West Sunset
Eudistylia vancouveri | Eudistylia vancouveri | Zirfaea pilsbryi |
rough piddocks (Zirfaea pilsbryi) quite interesting. These bivalve mollusks carve their way into firm substrate using rasplike valves and then spend their lives safely hunkered down in the niches they have built, extending siphons to filter feed. On this beach the piddocks inhabit large slabs of peat. Team captain Charlie Seablom reports that he was surprised to find a large clump of the Sabellid tubeworm Eudistylia vancouveri on the erratic that lies along the profile line. The clump was about the size of a bowling ball and was not there when the beach was monitored last year.
Elger Bay - June 4, 2008
There were 15 hardy Camano Island Beach Watchers (plus Bill B.) who gathered in rain gear on Wednesday June 4, prepared to do the monitoring at Elger Bay. It was the second of the series of beaches to monitor for the 2008 season on Camano. The write-in-the-rain paper came in handy as the data collectors jotted notes. We also made use of the new hand held, all the time wiping off the visual screen.
A few highlights were: a very colorful lined chiton, and a number of idotea, the absence of any urchins was noted. Uniquely shaped critters were a
Newly trained Camano Beach Watchers were welcomed to monitoring and received a hands-on overview of doing the profiles, quadrats, and data collection.
Comments received:
It is great to be with people who knew what they saw and shared the examples with me.
I surprised myself by being able to stand up after finishing the quadrats.
It was fun and I learned names.
Thanks to Bill B. for assisting in laying the survey lines, to all who came and participated, and Alice B. for hosting this monitoring session and providing a great report.
Tide this date was -4.1 at 11:46 AM (Greenbank)
Langley Seawall
Cerebratulus sp. | checking profile level | Dungeness crabs in mating embrace |
Langley Seawall Monitoring Team photo 2008 | Sand lance |
ribbon worm nearly 3 feet in length. The worm was identified as belonging to the genus Cerebratulus, a predator that feeds primarily on polychaete worms. As impressive as this individual was, Cerebratulus can grow more than 6 feet long! Other great finds were those of the forage fish Pacific sand lance (Ammodytes hexapterus), tiny Caprellid amphipods, and a pair of Dungeness crabs (Cancer magister) bound together in a mating embrace.
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Cama Beach - June 3, 2008
Mopalia | Tonicella3 | Tonicella2 |
Hemigrapsus2 | Pagurus2 |
Two profile lines were surveyed for Cama Beach on June 3 to start off the 2008 Intertidal Monitoring Season. It was a foul day for monitoring, being very chilly with heavy rains. It was also a challenge to use the handheld PCs for supplementing hard copy data recording as we had to keep pouring off the water that was puddling on top of them. Our first Profile Cama #1 is at the north end of the seawall and our second Profile Cama #2 is at the south end of the seawall.
The south seawall end point was chosen for profile Cama #2 largely because its line projected down onto and across the beach bisects the middle of the moon snail colonies that Cama seems to have in abundance. It is also a very old primary bulkhead wall of Cama resort. On this day the weather was so rainy that it was very difficult to see the profile line projection point on the Whidbey shore opposite; at times the distant shore was not even there! Beach Watchers with glasses were struggling to see and all of us were very cold and wet.
Twelve Beach Watchers and one guest, captained by Adele G., monitored Profile 1 out a distance of 268 feet to the -3.7 foot tide level. Though a variety of species were found including amphipods, anemone, barnacles, clams, crabs, isopods, shrimp, snails, green seaweed and seagrass, diversity within these species was not as great as found in previous years. For example, this year the crabs identified only included Hemigrapsus nudus and Pagarus, while in the past crabs identified also included Cancer gracilus, Cancer productus, Cancer magister and Hemigrapsus oregonensis. Also missing from previous years were limpets, nudibranch, sand dollars, sea stars, sea urchins, jellys, chitons, and red seaweed. These missing species with the exception of the jellys were found at Profile 2 however.
Profile 2’s monitoring team of ten Beach Watchers, captained by John C., monitored out to a distance of 230 feet to the -3.7 foot tide level. Overall Profile 2 was more abundant in species diversity and quantity than in Profile 1. The Profile 2 BWs were treated to the chitons, Mopalia sp. and Tonicella sp. Tonicella the lined chiton is best described with one word: gorgeous! This is a small chiton, 2 inches or less in length. The distinguishing feature of the lined chiton is that it has zigzag lines on the plates. Colors of this species vary and may include pink, red, white, black, purple, gold, or brown. The encircling girdle is usually dark with light colored patches. Predators of lined chitons include the purple sea star ( Pisaster ochraceus ), the six-rayed sea star ( Leptasterias sp .), and the Northern clingfish ( Gobiesox maeandricus ). The Mopalia is distinctive in having hairs or bristles sprouting from their girdles. Chitons from this genus are also unusual because while most chitons are strictly herbivores, the Mopalias consume animal materials including sponges, bryozoans, and hydroids in addition to algae.
Thanks to Cathy M. for collecting this data from the 2008 monitoring records and Mary Jo Adams for her Ez-Id pictures. Our cameras remained closed for the day due to very heavy rains.
South Lagoon Point
Megalorchestia columbiana | Megalorchestia columbiana | Pigeon guillemots |
Working in the rain. | Cakile maritima |
Lagoon Point monitoring team photo 2008 |
The best word to describe the South Lagoon Point team on their monitoring day was soggy! That seven member team, led by Libby Hayward endured steady rain from start to finish on June 3rd. They unanimously agreed that in spite of the rain, they had fun and saw a real diversity of intertidal life. The most charismatic species of the day was not on the beach but flying overhead. The team watched as about a dozen
pigeon guillemots spent a busy morning flying from their boroughs in the bluff out to the water and the birds were also observed engaging in mating behaviors. The survey team checked out backshore plants European sea rocket (Cakile maritima) and seabeach sandwort (Honkenya peploides) which grew above the strand line and then after working their way down to the lower intertidal zone they discovered purple encrusting sponge (Haliclona sp.), and Kathy Fritts spotted a tiny blue topsnail (Caliostoma ligatum). One unusual find was that of the amphipod Megalorchestia columbiana, commonly called the pale beach hopper. As beach hoppers go, this species is relatively large, reaching a length of 0.8 inches and the base of its antennae are pale orange. It somewhat resembles the California beach hopper (Megalorchestia californiana) but does not get quite as large (to 1.1 inches) and the antennae are not as brilliantly orange as the California hopper.