There's
no getting away from it, this May was very changeable
weather-wise but we have a beautiful day today and here we are, back
on the cliffs where we left off last week and the Prickly Pear is
celebrating the sunshine by bursting into flower.
If
you look at the lower plates you'll notice that the snails have
decided that this is a great place to build their summer city. If it
remains dry until October, which is quite possible, then this is
where they'll stay all sealed up and conserving moisture.
If
you take a look through the binoculars you can see a few
Yellow-legged Gulls taking a rest on the clear, calm waters. No, it's
not a seagull, there's no such bird (or so pedantic ornithologists
maintain). Truth of the matter is we've been calling them seagulls
since the 1540s for the simple reason that before we started dropping
food all over the place inland and burying heaps of treats in
landfill sites gulls were found by the sea where they could find a
meal. Gulls, being intelligent, adaptable opportunists now quite
happily form colonies far from the ocean waves. Even so, 'seagull'
was a bit of a superfluity, after all, we don't call whales seawhales
do we?
That's
the cliff path successfully negotiated so let's probe around the
rocks and see what's occurring. Quite a few of these little woodlouse
like creatures scurrying about. They are related as you might expect;
along with shrimps, crabs and lobsters. They are all crustaceans
(literally animals that have formed a crust referring to their hard
carapaces). This particular one looks almost like two different
animals joined together. The front half is quite sturdy with strong
legs whilst the back half tapers off with trailing legs. This is
rather a neat design; the front legs are land legs and the back ones
are sea legs. Crustaceans with this body plan are called amphipods
which is derived from the Greek meaning different feet. He's just
dropped into the sea – change drive gear! I suggest that we don our snorkels and follow his example. We'll swim out and
investigate those offshore islets, round the headland and come in to
some rather nice rock pools.
We
don't have big tides here in the Mediterranean so you don't have to
dive too deep or swim too far to get out of the intertidal zone. Just
a few metres down and these islets give us a whole new ecosystem to
explore. Now if you thought the amphipod was weird, welcome to the
venerable world of the demospongiae. These animals have been around
for over five hundred million years. They have no true tissues,
organs or nervous systems and they eat and breathe by letting the
water flow through them (which is why they are full of holes). You've
met them before of course, the familiar bath sponge (see
Beachcombin')
is a member of this class of ancient animals.
We're
about half way to the rock pools now and in slightly deeper water and
I see that we have a mixed school of fish swimming along with us
which gives me the chance to reiterate the difference between
venomous and poisonous. The golden eyed ones are Salema Porgies
(which are poisonous) and the others are Dusky Spinefoots, a type of
Rabbitfish (which are venomous). Where have you gone? Come back here.
The Rabbitfish have a couple of spines containing venom which it uses
for defence but don't worry, it's not strong enough to be a danger to
us and we're not going to threaten them anyway. The Salema Porgies on
the other hand can, in rare cases[1],
be poisonous and cause all sorts of hallucinations if you eat them.
Hence their alternative name of Dreamfish. So, if something bites or
stings and you get nasties in your bloodstream then it's venomous but
if you eat something and get nasties in your bloodstream then it's
poisonous. A nice little etymological distinction to muse upon whilst
you're recovering in hospital.
Well,
here we are at the rock pools which we'll be exploring next time so
let's take a leisurely swim back to where we left our clothes and
just enjoy the sun and the sea.
The
Extra Bit
#Jeremy
the #Vine Hawk Moth caterpillar has eaten seven vine leaves and has
waddled off under a stone to pupate. This may take him some time but
I'll let you know when he emerges in his full glory.
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That's beautiful! I always remember that you can find Minoan remains when you snorkel off Olous near Elounda
ReplyDeleteI haven't been snorkeling there yet, only birding, botanising and bug hunting.
Delete