It's a big world out there.

 It was raining steadily, and had been all day; clouds and fog hid the hills. A good day to stay home. A good day to visit the community in my little aquarium.

I wanted a photo of my big, beautiful worm. I'm still hoping to get a face shot, showing his 4 eyes. So I cleared away some of the seaweeds and laid down his favourite food, dried roasted seaweed. Meant for humans, but I don't mind sharing.

I sat there with the camera for an hour. Would the worm show his face? No. The hermits ate his seaweed.  And I took photos of any tiny critter that came close to the aquarium wall.

Sometimes it looks as if they were posing for me.

It's a big world out there. Periwinkle snail, checking out an empty snail shell.

One of the tiniest hermits. The smaller ones were elusive.

At the corners of the aquarium, a line of tape seals the join. It collects speckles of algae at the edges. And the smallest hermits climb up it, holding on to slight irregularities.

That same empty snail shell, now holding a small hairy hermit.

An amphipod, coming out from shelter underneath a mussel. Those white blobs are the anchor points on the glass of the mussel's byssal threads.

More aquarium photos tomorrow.

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Estaba lloviendo, había llovido todo el dia. Los bosques se escondían tras nubes y neblinas. Era un buen dia para quedarme en casa. Un buen dia para pasar el rato con la pequeña comunidad que vive en mi acuario.

Quería una foto del gran poliqueto que vive bajo la arena. Sigo con el propósito de sacarle una foto de la cara, con sus 4 ojos. Quité algo de las algas que tapaban la vista, y le ofrecí su comida favorita, algas secas tostadas. Comida de humanos, pero podemos compartir.

Me quedé allí sentada con la cámara en la mano por una hora. ¿Y se dignó el gusano a aceptar mi ofrenda? No. Ni siquiera se le ocurrió extender un tentáculo fuera de la arena. Los ermitaños se comieron sus algas. Y yo, pues, le saqué fotos a cualquier animalito que se acercara al vidrio.

A veces parece que se ponen en pose a propósito.

Fotos:

1. Un caracol marino, un bígaro, viendo una concha de caracol vacía, enorme en comparación.
2. Uno de los ermitaños más pequeños. Los muy muy chicos no se permitieron fotografiar.
3. En las esquinas del acuario, una cinta sella la junta y se le pegan granitos de algas. Los ermitaños más pequeños se trepan a estas cintas, agarrándose de las arrugas.
4. La misma concha vacía de la primera foto, ahora con un ermitaño.
5. Un anfípodo sale de su escondite debajo de un mejillón. Las bolitas blancas son los puntos de adhesión de los bisos del mejillón.

Mañana subo más fotos de los residentes del acuario. 

A smidgen of curiosity

Whenever I bring home seaweeds for my tankful of hermit crabs, I wash it and examine it closely before I plant it. I'm looking for the unexpected hitchhiker, the stray scale worm or baby starfish, the unidentified egg cases, the critters I've never seen before. There's always something.

After the seaweed is washed and planted, I set aside the water, usually overnight, to settle out. In the morning, I may find a half-dozen sharp-pointed snails climbing the walls of the bowl; tiny specks only identifiable as snails by their actions. Or a tubeworm or two may have set up housekeeping in the detritus. Maybe there's even a miniature clam; it takes a sharp eye and a lens to see these as they twist themselves down under cover of the muck.

One morning a few weeks ago, a speck almost too small to be seen was scrambling across a gap between sand grains. The motion looked more like a hermit's gait than the smooth glide of a snail or the sideward slide of a clam; faster, and more erratic. But it was too small to identify, even with the lens; I had to get out the microscope.

It was a hermit. Without his shell. I couldn't add him to the tank like that; he'd be swallowed by a barnacle or an anemone in an instant.

I kept him in a plastic cup while I prepared a batch of shells for him to choose from. All the tiny ones I had were far too big, but I'd seen before how the babies deal with that; they use the broken tips. I crumbled a bunch of shells and spread them in the cup.

A few hours later, the baby hermit was dressed; still too small to see clearly without a lens, but safely protected from barnacles, at least. He went into the tank with the big guys. And disappeared.

I was watching another very small hermit yesterday, when an smidgen of something orange came up to the glass and stared at me. My baby hermit, growing up!

Smile for the camera!

He stayed there for a while, long enough for me to take some photos, then run to get a pin for a size comparison.

With an ordinary dressmaker's pin, on this side of the glass.

He watched me for a while, then turned and wandered off. Later, wanting to show him to Laurie, I looked and looked, with a lens, without, with the water removed (low tide day, critters!); I couldn't find him anywhere. Never mind; I know he's there, somewhere.

What amazes me most about these critters is their intelligence and personality, even when they're no bigger than a grain of sand. It must take some ability to sort shells, choose the right one for your size and strength, make sure it's clean and empty; talents that even this pinhead critter uses. They're picky about their shells, too; they they test them for calcium content, shape, rollability, and something else; coolness? They like to wear the styles their peers are wearing. But they're mentally flexible enough to try something new when there are none of their favourites around.

But more than that is their curiosity about the world around them; this habit they develop of staring at me or the camera through the glass; their enthusiasm when they find something new to climb, a new vantage point, or just something to explore because it's there.

And all this goes on in a brain the size of the sharp point of that pin!