To Boldly Go To New Oceans
Between tidepooling sessions I’ve been reading about Proxima b, a newly discovered planet orbiting the star closest to our sun. Good...
Stranger than Science Fiction
Novelist John Steinbeck's best friend was Ed Ricketts, a marine biologist and pioneering ecologist who published Between Pacific Tides....
Master of Disguise
Like an octopus, the tidepool sculpin, Oligocottus maculatus, can change color to blend with its background. The sculpin's chameleon...
Eyes are Watching
Today a man hurried toward the Haystack Rock Awareness Program (HRAP) truck to tell us he'd "found a stingray." Maybe a bat ray? Or a...
Wondrous Slug
The first sea slug I saw at the ocean's edge was an opalescent nudibranch, Hermissenda crassicornis. I have since spotted many nudibranch...
A Universe in Every Pool
“It is advisable to look from the tide pool to the stars and then back to the tide pool again.” —John Steinbeck Tidepooling at night is...
Dendronotus Density Dispatch
Today at Haystack a startling abundance of nudibranchs in the genus Dendronotus appeared. The name Dendronotus is derived from dendrite,...
Smitten with Invertebrates
This is one of four alabaster nudibranchs, Dirona albolineata, I spotted today in the tidepools at Haystack. One of the luminous dragons...
Curious Creatures in a Hidden World
Amy and I headed out at dawn to Ecola Point with the goal of probing the low intertidal zone. We wanted to see some bizarre creatures....
Gumboot Chiton
Today I found my first gumboot chiton, Cryptochiton stelleri (aka the great Pacific chiton, the giant Pacific chiton, or the giant...
