February is an amazing time in the Cornish rock pools. Spring is coming and all sorts of fish, sea slugs and other creatures are moving onto the shore. Rock pooling is free, fun and exciting for all ages, so why not wrap up warm this half-term and head for the beach?
When?
There are some great low tides on Saturday 11th, Sunday 12th and Monday 13th February around lunch time. Check the tide times for your local area before you go.
Aim to start one to two hours before low tide as it’s safest to rock pool on an outgoing tide. Keep an eye out for the tide and always stay away from surging waves.
Joining a guided event is the very best way to discover marine wildlife. Experts (including me!) will be on hand to help you find and identify the crabs, fish, shells, starfish and more. At the end of the session you’ll be able to meet everyone’s best finds in the ‘Shore Laboratory’ and find out how the animals live and how to conserve them.
(If anyone know of any other rock pooling events on this half-term, please let me know and I’ll list them here).
Cornish Rock Pools – spider crab at Looe rockpool ramble
Where?
Any beach with some sheltered rockpools will do. There are lots all around Cornwall – some of my favourites can be found under the beaches tab at the top of this page.
What to do…
The shore can be very exposed, so make sure you’re well wrapped up and waterproofed. Your feet will get wet so wellies are essential.
Otherwise, all you need is a tub and/or bucket (please don’t use nets as these harm delicate animals). A camera and species guide are useful.
Head for the lower shore (keeping a safe distance from the sea’s edge) and go slowly, looking in shaded, wet areas like pools.
Under rocks and seaweed are great places to look, but move them gently and always return them to how you found them.
Even in the depths of winter the rock pools are full of life. In February spring is just round the corner and lots of animals will be moving in for the breeding season.
Expect to see crabs, fish, anemones, sea snails, prawns, starfish and perhaps even a sea slug – these little creatures come in an amazing variety of shapes and colours.
If you need help identifying something, take a photo if possible and get in touch through my contact page, Facebook or Twitter. I love seeing your finds.
The other side of the Looe valley has disappeared. Beneath the thick Cornish sea fog, a steady, soaking drizzle is blowing in. Junior, contemplating the scene out of our back window, decides it’s a perfect day to go for a picnic at Port Nadler.
Two and a half miles later, with water running off our noses and mud splashed up our waterproof trousers, we arrive in the deserted bay. We listen to the whistles of oystercatchers, sounding closer than they are in the fog. Junior follows trails of bird footprints across the beach.
The sun doesn’t shine on our picnic, but the rain eases and we begin to catch glimpses of the sea through the mist. After a quick sandwich, we start exploring.
The cool, damp conditions aren’t great for humans, but they’re ideal for rockpool creatures that need to avoid drying out. I’ve barely taken a few steps across the rocks when I spot a decorator crab out for a walk among the seaweed. It’s so well covered with pieces of weed that I have to move it to take a distinguishable photo.
A decorator crab – a small species of spider crab – out for a walk
It’s not a particularly big tide, but it’s low enough to access some wide, shallow pools and an area strewn with loose rocks begging to be turned.(more…)
After a week of ear-numbing northerlies, the low January sunshine is at last winning through. Junior sets to work with his bucket and spade, attempting to create a sand fort that can be seen from space while I take a stroll at the water’s edge.
Looe Beach – a herring gull is also checking out the pile of shells at the water’s edge
The stretch of sand that forms Looe beach is ideal for summer holidaymakers to lounge on, but generally offers little to the rockpooler, unlike the surrounding shores. Today is different; probably due to a combination of large tides and strong winds from an unusual direction.
Glistening mounds of shells are heaped the length of the shore, and are being nudged onwards by the incoming tide. They crack under my feet despite my efforts not to trample them.
Shells on Looe beach
It’s not unusual to see the odd limpet or a few mussel shells here – the harbour is carpeted with them – but this haul of shells is not just large, it’s more diverse than usual. There’s such a kaleidoscope of blues, whites, oranges and pinks that I have to get in close to focus on individual shells.(more…)
Next month, 50 years will have passed since the Torrey Canyon tanker ran aground off the Isles of Scilly, releasing a 700 square km oil slick. On the last day of 2016, I visited Porth Mear to learn how a long-term survey has revealed the secrets of the beach’s fragile recovery, and to see if the St Piran’s hermit crab (Clibanarius erythropus)has managed to make more than a temporary comeback.
Clibanarius erythropus – A red legged hermit crab making a comeback in the Cornish rock pools this year.
When the Torrey Canyon hit rocks in February 1967, its cargo of oil ended up on the Cornish, Breton and nearby coasts. The oil, along with huge quantities of solvent emulsifying chemicals used in an attempt to disperse it, decimated seabird populations and marine wildlife.
Concerned by the impact on his local beach, biology teacher, Richard Pearce, decided to monitor the wildlife on the shore three times a year. He’s been doing his survey without fail ever since.
I wasn’t born when Richard first marked out his quadrats on Porth Mear beach, but I grew up hearing stories of the horror people felt at the sight of the thick black tide, the pervasive smell of the oil, and the woefully unprepared volunteers attempting to shift the cloying oil with garden tools. Decades later, lumps of tar were still washing onto our beaches after every storm.
I’ve always wondered what the process of recovery looked like, so I jumped at the chance to join Richard at Porth Mear for survey number 150.
Survey 150…
It’s clear, after many surveys, that Richard knows the beach well. So well, in fact, that even when the gouged crosses and splodges of green paint that mark the survey quadrats have worn away or been covered up by seaweed, he still knows exactly where they are.
Richard examines a quadrat while Chris notes the data
As he shows me his method, calling out the presence and coverage of seaweeds, barnacles and molluscs to his partner, Richard tells me how after the Torrey Canyon disaster the green seaweeds were the first to flourish. With many of the grazing molluscs wiped out by the oil and the chemicals used to disperse it, the seaweeds soon took over. After this other animals gradually returned.
Crosses in the rock and paint marks show the quadrat boundaries – now on his 150th survey Richard knows just where they all are!
Over the years, Richard has seen many changes. Some are seasonal or weather related, others are harder to explain but may be due to warming seas. Why one pool that was once crammed with mussels now has almost none and why limpets are doing particularly well this season is hard to say, but the data he is collecting reveals changes that would otherwise go unnoticed.
Not for the faint-hearted – Richard has to scrabble down steep rocks and wade knee-deep to reach some of his quadrats.
The tide drops and, while Richard is knee-deep examining a quadrat alongside a long deep pool, I explore the lower shore pools, determined to find out whether the St Piran’s crab is still here. After an absence of more than 30 years, this equal-clawed hermit crab started to reappear around Cornwall in 2016 and we had one record on this beach in the spring. Although past records are too patchy to be sure, it’s thought that pollution from the Torrey Canyon played a role in the loss of this species, so 50 years on it would be lovely to find it re-establishing.
Every time I see a shell move, I leap on it, looking for the red legs and spotty eyes, but every one is a common hermit crab (Pagurus bernhardus).
The disappointment mounts… I find lots of common hermit crabs (Pagurus bernhardus) – the right claw is much chunkier than the left with lots of raised bumps on top.
Rooting around in the pools always reveals some unexpected treasures. I make my first record of a stalked jellyfish (Calvadosia cruxmelitensis) at this site.
Stalked jellyfish – Calvadosia cruxmelitensis – at Porth Mear
This is always a good beach for finding Cornish clingfish, and the rocks of the lower shores don’t disappoint. In one small area I find a dozen of these stunning little duck-faced fish, some with iridescent blue spots on their heads.
Cornish clingfish at Porth Mear
And another Cornish clingfish…
As I follow a gully across the shore I find several scorpion fish lurking among the rocks. Brittle stars lurch away into the seaweed and Xantho pilipes crabs close up, pretending to be pebbles.
My other half and Junior join me, hunting for crabs and fish. Every thirty seconds I remind them that we need to look for little hermit crabs and they ignore me as they should. They’re used to me and my missions.
Not a hermit crab… a feisty male edible crab at Porth Mear.
Junior at least keeps pointing out suitable pools. He knows they like the ones with pink coralline seaweed and there are lots here. I barely have time to glance at one before he’s trying to drag me to the next.
And then it happens. A shell moves and as soon as I pick it up I know. The legs are red, the shape’s wrong for the common hermit crab.When the crab extends its claws there can be no doubt, they’re hairy and pretty much equal sized. This is a St Piran’s crab.
When I see the red legs and equal-sized claws I know – a St Piran’s hermit crab at Porth Mear
I yell like I’ve won a golden ticket. Under my camera it’s easy to see the black and white spotty eyes of the crab. We all gather to look and as I take an underwater photo, I see other shells moving.
The long eye-stalks with black and white-spotted eyes are distinctive too – a St Piran’s crab at Porth Mear
Sure enough, this next shell has a St Piran’s crab in it, and the next, and the next. While I’m taking photos in the pool, Richard is examining shells on the rock by a small overhang. “There are nine more here,” he says. Soon we’ve counted at least fourteen. They’re all larger than the one found here earlier in 2016.
A St Piran’s hermit crab in the pool at Porth Mear
Whether there are other groups of St Piran’s crabs on this beach is hard to say. The tide is surging in now so we’ve run out of time to search.
A St Piran’s crab foraging in the pool at Porth Mear
The existence of the St Piran’s crab is a fragile one; storms, temperature change, pollution and disturbance threaten our shore wildlife now more than ever. Richard’s survey provides an incredible conservation tool with its wealth of data about what’s here and how it changes.
50 years on from the Torrey Canyon disaster, the confirmation of the St Piran’s crab’s comeback is an uplifting way to complete this survey (and the year).
A Scorpion fish at Porth MearA rock gobyA brittle star on the move at Porth Mear.Xantho pilipes crab pretending to be a pebble at Porth MearAs the last tide of 2016 rushed in, I had to say au revoir to this little St Piran’s hermit crab. Hopefully they’ll be sticking around in 2017. Happy New Year!
In a year of turmoil in the human world, the colour and diversity of the Cornish rock pools have revived my spirits on every visit. While there’s much to be done about plastic waste, discarded fishing gear, pollution and other threats to our marine wildlife, the end of the year feels a good time to reflect on the positives.
So, here are a few of my rockpool highlights from 2016… (and a scroll down for a video of a chough!)
January
Flat periwinkle in the Cornish rock pools
Flat periwinkles are so common on the shore that I’m guilty of overlooking them. Taking a morning to watch them was a revelation. They’re colourful, industrious and surprisingly engaging. They’re well worth a look, especially on stormy winter days when the lower shore isn’t accessible.
February
Anapagurus hyndmanni hermit crab
On the first big tides of the year, I explored a new section of the rocky shore near Looe and found an amazing gully teeming with life. Among the cowries, sea squirts, sea slugs and crabs, I came across this gorgeous little hermit crab with one huge white-gloved claw, the Anapagurus hyndmanni.
March
Galathea strigosa – a squat lobster
In March the rock pools were bursting into life. Baby cat sharks were hatching in front of my eyes and other fish were busy laying their eggs. Among the rocks I spotted this Galathea strigosa squat lobster – a rare sight on my local beach. This one was only a few centimetres long, but its colours were fabulous.
April
Scarlet and gold cup coral
In April I visited one of my favourite childhood beaches, Porth Mear near Porthcothan, with a group of North Devon naturalists. We recorded sea spiders, unusual crabs and had the most northerly sighting (at that time) of the St Piran’s Hermit crab, which has made a comeback around Cornwall in 2016. Best of all, we found a pool full of Scarlet and gold cup corals. These corals were way too small for my old camera to capture but this time I was better prepared.
May
Limacia clavigera sea slug
The water was warming up nicely in May and little eyes were starting to look back at me from the fish eggs clustered under the rocks. Sea slugs were also making their way onto the shore and, as always, blowing me away with their colours. This yellow-clubbed sea slug (Limacia clavigera) was exploring the seaweed in West Looe and was a big hit with the children on our shore survey.
June
Clingfish eggs – with one newly-hatched fish (centre)
Under a shining sun, June was a fabulous month for rockpooling. What grabbed my attention most were the fish eggs. To the naked eye there’s not much to see, but with some help from my camera, I was looking into the fully-formed eyes of baby clingfish and seeing their spotted tails wrapped around their noses. In this photo there was even one recently-hatched baby among the crowd.
July
A juvenile turbot at Lundy Bay
At the beginning of July, the Bioblitz at Lundy Bay saw perfect conditions, with a tompot blenny, moon jellyfish and even a slow worm among the beach finds. The high point for me was holding this tiny baby turbot – a flatfish – which had been found using nets in the sandy shallows.
August
Cornish Rock Pools Junior meets a bootlace worm
During the school holidays, the more accessible sandy beaches are packed, but there’s often plenty of space on the rocky shore. I took Junior and his friends out to explore. On this day we saw jewel anemones, a stalked jellyfish and a butterfish, but our highlight was this bootlace worm. According to the Guinness Book of Records, it’s the world’s longest animal – this was just part of the one we found.
September
A male worm pipefish with eggs on his belly
I joined a Shoresearch survey at Hannafore in early September and, as always, there was lots to see. Although they’re not uncommon on the shore, the pipefish are special creatures. They are close relatives of the seahorses. This male is carrying eggs in a special groove down his belly.
October
St Piran’s Crab in Concarneau
In October I took a little ‘school trip’ to see our Celtic cousins in Brittany. I soon discovered that the ‘St Piran’s Crab’, which has reappeared in Cornwall this year after decades of absence, is the common species on the Breton shores. They’re so new to our shores that the only ones we see are tiny. The full-grown specimens were much easier to photograph – showing their equal-sized claws and white-spotted eyes.
November
Strawberry anemone basking in a brief moment of November sunshine
In the last couple of months of the year I spent most of my time looking for stalked jellyfish in the pools, but I couldn’t help but be distracted by the sunshine falling on this strawberry anemone.
December
Cornish rockpool junior’s first stalked jellyfish – Calvadosia cruxmelitensis
Stalked jellyfish are relatively easy to see this time of year, when the seaweed has died back, but only if the conditions are calm and clear. During several calm days of spring tides this December I recorded dozens of these little gems in the rock pools. When the land is looking bare and brown in winter, there’s still no shortage of colour in the rock pools.
I closed my year with a walk on my home beach of Mawgan Porth. As I watched sand gobies skidding away under a rock, an unmistakeable cry made me look up. On the clifftop just metres away, a solitary chough was feeding, plunging its scarlet deep into the turf. These birds were considered extinct here when I was a child on this beach, but now I’m able to show my son his first chough in the place I grew up.
We came across a chough again at sunset and my other half took this video.
What better sign could there be? 2017 will bring challenges for wildlife, but as long as there are enough people who take action, positive change is possible.
I doubt anyone in Looe can have missed it – the moment today when Cornish Rock Pools Junior found his first stalked jellyfish. His scream of, “I’ve actually found one!” rang across the beach and echoed off the hillside.
Cornish rockpool junior’s first stalked jellyfish – Calvadosia cruxmelitensis
His first find was closely followed by his second, next to which was a third. A volunteer from Looe Marine Conservation Group found a fourth. The Natural England team found some more and by the time we were done we recorded a whopping 26 Stalked jellyfish.
Calvadosia campanulata stalked jellyfish
As all our records today were of two species (Calvadosia cruxmelitensis and Calvadosia campanulata) I’m feeling hopeful that they may soon be added as recognised features of the Looe and Whitsand Bay Marine Conservation Zone.
Looe Marine Conservation Group volunteer, Dawn, finds her first Stalked jellyfish on our survey
In December, good tides, mild temperatures and low winds coincide about as often as it snows on the Cornish coast (i.e. about once every ten years). Amazingly, today was one of those rare occasions and the rockpools were in impressive festive colours. What could be more Christmassy than this Dahlia anemone?
Festive colours in the Cornish rock pools – a Dahlia anemone
We were doing so well with our stalked jellyfish survey that I didn’t feel too bad about getting distracted. When I spotted a wriggling piece of seaweed, I chased it across the rocks.
If a piece of seaweed runs off, it’s probably a spider crab
As I suspected, under the seaweed decorations was a small spider crab species. This one was a Macropodia deflexa, a long-legged spider crab.
A Macropodia deflexa crab – covered in seaweed decorations
Relying on their camouflage, scorpion fish were lying still among the seaweed, allowing us to come right up to them.
A scorpion fish hides among the seaweed
It was a huge relief that everything turned out so well for our Stalked jellyfish survey. Had the conditions been less favourable we’d have been more likely to find none at all. 26 was an amazing total.
I needed my hot chocolate afterwards, but it was an afternoon well spent with some fabulous people. And tomorrow the forecast is even better… I’ll let you know what I find!
Another Christmas sea-flower – the Daisy anemone. In full bloom at Hannafore, LooeLike a string of Christmas lights – the Blue-rayed limpetOur Stalked jellyfish survey at Hannafore Beach, West Looe
This week I’m planning rockpooling events for next year and adding identification pages to my website….
Yesterday it was so foggy you couldn’t see the sea in front of your wellies. Before that it was raining; before that it was blowing a gale and on the one day the sun came out I was nowhere near the beach. It’s not bad for eggcase hunts – which Cornish Rock Pools junior loves – but that’s about it.
This time of year, when the short days and inclement weather make even die-hard rockpoolers like me reach for the duvet, I turn to flicking through the 2017 tide table and dreaming of sunny days and gleaming expanses of shore.
Is it too early for New Year’s resolutions? Mine is to spend (even) more time sharing my love of rockpooling with others. I’ve put all the Looe Marine Conservation Group rockpooling events in my diary and I’m also hoping to volunteer with the utterly fabulous Fox Club (the junior branch of the Cornwall Wildlife Trust), helping to run events around the county. Then there will be other events for the local scouts and home educating groups to fit in, and who knows what else. (more…)
My local area is special and it’s partly down to some fabulous little jellies we find here.
Looe and Whitsand Bay was one of the first to be designated a Marine Conservation Zone (MCZ) three years ago. Apparently Ocean quahog (a clam shell), pink sea fans, pink sea fan anemones and a stalked jellyfish species (Haliclystus sp.) can all be found here.
As you’d expect, stalked jellyfish have a stalk which attaches to seaweed so they don’t float around like other jellies. They have eight arms with tentacles on the end.
I’m hoping we can add more species to that list. There have been some local records of giant gobies, which are one of the MCZ ‘feature’ species and we’ve found three other species of stalked jellyfish on our beaches.
The problem with stalked jellyfish is that they’re tiny and seaweed coloured. In theory, the winter die-back of seaweed makes them easier to see, but Cornish winters don’t often provide the calm conditions you need to spot stalked jellies. Consequently not many people see them and even fewer people record their discoveries on ORKS – so please, please do share your finds!
In a quest to add more evidence that these species are present in significant numbers, I take Cornish Rock Pools Junior for a wander through the pools at a quiet local bay.
Grey herons like fishing in this quiet bay – Plaidy beach, East Looe
I find it’s best to focus on nothing else if I’m going to find stalked jellies. The problem is, as anyone who’s seen me in the vicinity of a chocolate hobnob will know, that I have no willpower. So, I spend the first half hour snapping this gorgeous strawberry anemone as it stretches its tentacles towards the last of the autumn sunshine. (more…)
Things have been quiet on this page the last couple of months. Cornish Rock Pools Junior, Other Half and I took an extended holiday to visit the towns and beaches of Brittany. As always our travels had a bit of a marine theme…
“Est-ce que c’est un anémone?” the eager child in the dark-rimmed spectacles asks. We explain what a ‘stalked jellyfish’ is to the class of seven-year-olds. “Jellyfish!” they chant.
Stalked jellyfish – a Lucernariopsis cruxmelitensis.
Between fascinating excursions to the fire station and the sardine factory, we are giving impromptu English lessons to a class of primary school students during our twinning visit to Quiberon in Brittany.
We have covered the words goby, crab, jellyfish and shark so far and there’s still a sea of raised hands. The children seem desperate to tell us about their finds around the shores of Quiberon. (more…)
It’s funny how the summer days float by. The house has been practically bursting with people for weeks now and I haven’t found the space to write about our many beach trips, but August still feels like a lazy month.
It reminds me of my childhood summers; a jumble of paddling, swimming, rockpooling and finds. Only I’ve just turned 40 and now I’m the one remembering hats and towels, preparing picnics and being called on constantly to help build dams or identify creatures. Every few days I realise that I’ve failed to take many photos and still haven’t blogged anything I’ve found. It’s just the way August goes.
Compass jellyfish. Also known as sea nettles as they pack quite a little sting, these jellyfish have beautiful markings.
The warm waters are drawing in all sorts of creatures at the moment. The north coast especially is teeming with jellyfish. Harmless Moon jellyfish have washed up in their thousands. These transparent little jellies have four mauve circles in their centre in a pattern that reminds me of cucumber slices (OK, that’s probably just me).
One of many moon jellyfish washed up by the strong swell. This species is harmless.
Other jellyfish that have mild stings, like the compass jellyfish are also washing in and I think my thigh met with one of the many blue jellies in the water at Mawgan Porth a couple of weeks ago from the unattractive rash I developed! On the plus side, some friends found a spiny starfish in a pool at the top of the mid-shore pools, which looked like it might be feeding on the stranded jellies.(more…)
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