Farewell party?

My aquarium critters needed eelgrass. Lots of eelgrass. I'm going to take them, tank and all, on a 5 hour trip, probably bumpy at times, and they'll have to leave most of their water behind. Several gallons of water sloshing back and forth unpredictably can cause quite a bit of damage, so I'll leave them an inch or so, and pack the tank with wet eelgrass. The anemones and snails will hide under the sand, and the hermits will cling to the eelgrass, and all will be well. I hope.

Very tiny hermit, climbing the eelgrass.

Down at Boundary Bay, I found everything all laid out for me; piles of fresh eelgrass, with roots and the diatom fuzz the hermits love, big sheets of sea lettuce, even a fresh holdfast, just the right size for the tank. The wind and tide had been working in my favour; the tide was high and still coming in, and the wind had whipped the waves into a froth. Together, they'd dug up an eelgrass bed from the lower intertidal zone and deposited it, still fresh and barely tangled, at the water line for me.

My hermits are happy.

So were the wind surfers.

I had another item on my shopping list: I wanted photos of spiders for the Arachtober group. So I poked around the fences and alleys of Beach Grove, peering into cracks and under shrubs. (The residents there are very tolerant; mostly they smile. One man told me there were many wolf spiders along his fence. I didn't find any.)

I found, first, a couple of abandoned paper wasp nests.

Look at this (click) full size to see the texture of the paper.

And yes, I found two spiders.

Large cross spider.

These get their name from the cross shape (sort of) on their abdomen. The scientific name is Araneus diadematus, meaning "crown spider", which doesn't sound quite right. I don't see a crown. This one looks more like a Christmas tree, all decorated. The ones here in North Delta are mostly orange and brown; both the Beach Grove spiders were brown and grey.

And then I drove home, saying, "Goodbye, see you later," to all the old favourite landmarks on the way. Next week at this time, I'll be on the Island.