Swimming school

It was a quiet afternoon down at the wharf. Very few birds. No harbour seals. Even the usual kelp and assorted crabs and sponges on the pilings were in hiding. But there were fish. Tiny ones, from an inch or so to a couple of inches long, hundreds of them, and everywhere I looked.

Most were swimming just under the surface.

Where they broke the surface, nibbling at invisible (to me) goodies, they made rings. And the rings made the fish look stripy.

And just above the surface, a patient cross spider, catching mainly dust. Good thing the fish aren't jumping!

A couple of tubeworms on the underside of a wharf office.

Upside-down

Reflected trees, from the docks at Discovery Harbour Marina.

Deciduous

And evergreen

No need for feet

In an empty boat berth at the Discovery Harbour Marina, hundreds of young herring were dancing. There's no other word for it; they swirled in loops and figure eights, twisted down into dark water, then leapt to break the surface, creating rows of winking lights. They split into groups, which met and mingled in complex patterns, then pivoted to promenade stage right, in unison. All that was missing was the music.

Upswing

Spin

All together now

(The water reflected the clear blue of the sky, and a few clouds; the herring were silvery grey. I saturated the colour and increased the contrast to define the herring.)

Underwater flower garden

When I see the word, "worms", my stick-in-the-mud brain still jumps to the picture of a soft, pink, eyeless, squirmy tube; the earthworm of my gardens. I still have to remind it of worms with eyes and jaws, worms with legs; a multitude of legs, worms with long conveyor belt tentacles, worms with lids, worms that conduct imaginary orchestras. And worms that look like flowers.

Maroon, peach, green, pink. Feather duster worms, growing downward, under the dock.

Pale green and blueberry "flowers".

My Marine Life Encyclopedia has 49 pages of worms, almost 300 different species of marine worms in this area, including 8 species of feather duster worms, like these, from half an inch tall up to about 10 inches.

I'm not sure which species these are. The largest are about 6 to 8 inches tall, as far as I can tell without diving to measure them. The community may be a mixed grouping of the Split-branch feather duster (8 inches, solid colour plume), the Vancouver feather duster (10 inches, banded crown) or the polymorph feather duster (7 inches, variable crown); and the whole bunch of them have tiny eyes, looking back at me.

Lifer! Probably for both of us.

Under the logs and lumber of any floating construction, down where the sun rarely reaches, the water level is constant, the currents weakened, myriads of animals and plants live their sheltered lives, away from the prying eyes of the humans who clomp along overhead. Unless there is a gap between the floats, the surface is mometarily still, the light turns down at the perfect angle, and a human just chances to look down that gap at that moment. And then, if the human happens to be of a curious bent, she flops down on her knees or belly, and peers down that gap. And sees eyes, staring back at her.

Spiny pink scallop, Chlamys hastata. She has dozens of eyes, lined up along her lips. She can't see as well as I do; all she saw of me (I think) was my shadow.

Another angle, showing a bit of her shell, and two anemones sheltering underneath. The blue "pillar" is a mussel shell.

I'll back off a bit, to show the mini underwater garden along the base of the float I was lying on.

Tunicates, purple stuff, more tunicates, mystery critters, worms, and hydroids. Yesterday's anemones were just to the left of this patch.

Moving to the right; more tunicates, and the scallop.

I cropped these photos down, to show the individual critters a bit better:

Tunicates, unidentified. (With intake, outflow siphons circled.)

As far as I can tell, the pale cyan blobs have siphons, as well, and would be another species of tunicate (aka sea squirt). The red line in the centre points to another animal that is so transparent that its internal organs, and its food are visible through the wall. I think the other red line points to a half-way shut down anemone. On the far left, there is a hydroid stalk, and on the left of the base of the big tunicates, the flowery shape is the feeding tentacles of a worm.

Tunicates, tunicates, worms, etc. And what are those two potato-like blobs?

And there's still that pink thingie:

I think it may be a compound ascidian. like the red ascidian, or maybe the mushroom compound tunicate. Or something else? What do you think?

Worms tomorrow.

Down payment

There are more things in heaven and earth under the wharf, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

With apologies to Wm. Shakespeare (Hamlet Act 1, scene 5)

I looked at one of the under-the-wharf photos, and was lost. Herring can wait! I've got critters to identify, or to wish I could identify. Here's the first of the lot, and the easiest to recognize.

Three plumose anenomes, a bit of sea lettuce, some purply, tentacled gift-wrap ribbon, other stuff, worms, maybe.

But what is that pink, five-armed, blobby thing in the middle? It doesn't look like a starfish. Or does it?

This was taken down the crack between two wharf segments, with the sunlight illuminating the water beneath, and glancing down at an angle from above. The blue at the bottom is wharf paint.

Now, back to work: I've got some strange beasties to identify.

Early supper

I checked the tide tables for Campbell River. Not promising. All the low tides this month and the next fall in the middle of the night. And therefore all those glorious, teeming creatures and seaweeds are out of reach and invisible for the time being.

So I went down to Discovery Harbour Marina. There, the critters rise with the tide; some of them are visible, if not reachable. And there I found anemones, herring, starfish, sponges, spiders (not sea critters, of course, but they're everywhere) and more. Even a hunting seal! (But a whale went by, and I was too low down to see it. Next time, maybe.)

Here's the seal.

Swimming in the shade between the first wharf and the rip rap.

I got just this short glimpse of him before he ducked back underwater. Ten minutes later, walking back to the ramp, I saw him again. This time, he had a mouthful:

Supper is served; fresh salmon steak, and the head, too!

He dove, came up again, gulping salmon in big bites, wolfing it down as a dog does. He went down again, and the ripples faded. I waited a while, but he had gone, taking his leftovers with him. A gull swooped low overhead, but there were no scraps to be found, and he left. So did I.

I'll be processing the rest of the photos for a few days. Herring tomorrow, I think.

More Discovery Harbour Marina reflections

Not boats this time.

Marina shed

Riprap along the shore

Yellow sponge, with building reflections

Not a reflection. Large spined kelp-like seaweed.

At Discovery Harbour Marina, Campbell River.

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Reminder: Rock Flipping Day is Sunday, September 9th. Instructions, history, etc.

Cleanup crew under the dock. And a few stars.

At the Discovery Harbour Marina* in Campbell River, we divided our time between looking at boats and reflections and peering into the depths of the murky water, looking for life. In spite of the bright sunlight, or maybe because of it, since it highlighted all the dust and floaters on the surface, it was almost impossible to see more than a few metres down, so most of what we saw was in the narrow gap between the first dock and the shore.

I cleaned most of the bright surface interference off these photos, and adjusted the contrast to make things more visible.

The largest sea cucumber I have ever seen. I estimated it at about a foot and a half long. An inoffensive scavenger, busy vaccuming the rocks.

In the corner between two docks at right angles, the chains were draped with huge seaweeds colonized by many different animals. I think those red sprays are feather duster tubeworms. The yellow mass is a sponge. I don't know what the white blobs are.

Leather star. This starfish eats sponges, anemones, and sea cucumbers. To the left, barely visible, is a good-sized kelp crab.

Two small sunflower stars.

A medium-sized sunflower star. We saw a much larger one, but it was too deep for a decent photo. I counted over 20 arms on the visible part of the star, about 3/4 of the whole. This one would have about 15.

The sunflower stars are major predators. A man who passed us as we were looking at the largest one, angrily called them oyster pirates. They eat any invertebrate they can find, including other starfish, although their favourite foods are sea urchins and bivalves (clams, etc.). We didn't see any sea urchins this trip, but plenty of sunflower stars.

*K Dock, just past Moxie's.

Wobblies

Reflections at Discovery Harbour Marina, Campbell River

Just for fun.