New Bedford shore: inspiration for Species of Least Concern #3
My niece, about to completely submerge in the Atlantic ocean for the first time. This event and others led to much of the content of the Species of Least Concern podcast.
Bladder rockweed.
Jingle shells (not mentioned in podcast) are the shells of an inedible oyster species. Many are found with holes in them already making construction of a simple windchime easy. Holes are either from where the shell attached to its substrate, or from a predatory snail drilling in to eat the animal inside.
The lump of marine algae in my hand is unknown to me. Maybe something like Sea Cauliflower? The green stuff is called "dead man's fingers" (Codium fragile) not to be confused with the fungus of the same name. I was surprised to learn that it's an invasive species.
This green hairy marine algae is unknown to me (well, I've known about it for years, but I don't know its name or ecology). I wonder if its the same stuff that plagues the people who keep salt-water aquaria.
Man-made structure participating in the local ecology.
An amphipod crustacean, one of the many creatures that gets called a "sand flea."
They are the harmless detritus feeders that jump around crazily when you lift a clump of seaweed on the beach. This big one obliged me by posing. I think with its rear appendages not touching anything it couldn't jump away.