And ... the rest of the animals I found on that one trip to Stories Beach, in no particular order:
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| A Black prickleback, Xiphister artopurpureus. Look for the thin white lines radiating back from the eye; his pal, the rock prickleback has wide pale lines in a black field instead. |
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| Red rock crab, running for cover. |
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| Bright yellow or greenish yellow eggs, possibly belonging to a clingfish. |
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| A couple of tiny hermits, dwarfed by the dogwinkles and isopods around them. |
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| Rockweed isopods come in a variety of colours, from green to warm browns, to purplish blacks. I hadn't seen one before with that distinctive dark and light green pattern. Could it be a different species? |
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| Unidentified sculpin. |
"Coloration is often virtually useless as a tool for identification. Extreme variation is the norm." (Marine Life of the Pacific Northwest, VB62)
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| Purple sea star. I saw several dozen, all healthy. Good to see, after the onslaught of Sea Star Wasting Disease that wiped out so many. |
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| Where the worms are. |
According to
Kozloff, these are probably the tubes of bamboo worms, hiding 6 inches or more below the surface of the sand. Some day I'll manage to dig one out, to be sure.
The prickleback is a very unusual looking fish (I'm assuming). Is the picture is shallow water or is it on the sand? - Margy
ReplyDeleteThe fish was wet, but there was only a shallow film of water over the sand.
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