Tag: Crustaceans
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Camoflauge with Bright Colors: The Red-banded transparent Shrimp
California tide pooling comes with the big and famous animals that all beachgoers want to see: anemones, sea stars, urchins, and crabs. But many other very common animals don’t get noticed, despite being all around. The red-banded transparent shrimp (Heptacarpus sitchensis) is one of them. Look closely and you’ll begin to notice these tiny, often…
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Tide Pooling Log: Birthday Nature Walk along the Beach
On the morning of my birthday late this summer, I wanted to go to the beach– of course! The tide was somewhere between 1 and 2 feet, so I didn’t expect to do much tide pooling, if any of the rocks would evening be exposed at this location in SoCal. Despite this, I thought we…
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Tide Pooling Log: Pre-Dawn Summer Low Tide in Orange County
Pre-dawn summer low tides are some of the best of the year in Southern California. You can avoid the crowds and the heat while getting the warm water summer species during an excellent low tide. I took advantage of several of the low tides in June this year. Check out this article from my trip…
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I Went to the Intertidal During a “High” Low Tide; Here’s What I Found
During the lowest of low daytime tides, you’ll find hordes of people at popular tide-pooling locations. Everyone knows that you have to visit during the lowest tides to see the best stuff, right? Well, kinda. For the intertidal enthusiast, visiting during the lowest tides is the only way you might see the rare low intertidal…
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Feeling Crabby? Tuna Crab Swarms and Mass Stranding Events
In the last several months, an unusual creature has been showing up in California’s coastal waters. Although they haven’t yet made their way into the intertidal, huge swarms of tuna crabs (Grimothea planipes), a pelagic member of the squat lobster family, have been seen off the SoCal’s coasts and may end up stranded on beaches. …
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Tide Pooling Log: Napili, Maui, HI, Day 2
Day one implies day two, right? If you haven’t read the first tide pooling log about our finds in the intertidal in Hawaii this fall, check out this article before reading on. The finds the night before had been so great that we just had to go back out on the rocks again. It was…
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Tide Pooling Log: Cinque Terre, West Coast of Italy
The Mediterranean is known as non-tidal as the tides of the Atlantic just barely squeeze a little water through the straight of Gibraltar before moving on. But on our trip to Italy this month, I was determined to see some intertidal animals. After doing some research and asking helpful friends on iNaturalist, I found a…
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Striped Shore Crab: The Tide Pool Clean Up Crew
If you’ve visited Southern California tide pools, chances are pretty good you’ve seen a striped shore crab (Pachygrapsus crassipes) scuttling away from your steps. These small crabs are prolific in some intertidal zones, so much so that I hardly notice them when visiting the intertidal. But these creatures a worth a second look. From their…
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Tide Pooling Log: Corona Del Mar, December
To be quite honest, I prefer tide pooling at night. While often the cold and darkness can make logistics harder, the animals you see are so worth it. There is nothing quite like being on the rocks at night with all the nocturnal animals emerging from their hiding places just after dusk. Recently, we visited…
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Tide Pooling Log: Buggy’s Beach, Ketchikan, AK
The Pacific Northwest is famed for its abundance of life in the intertidal and while visiting Alaska’s inside passage, I knew I had to find a place to go tide pooling. Thanks to a helpful Luan Roberts (@Luanimal, of Nature Lookings), I found a beach near Ketchikan, far outside the touristy area that I could…
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The Tidepooler is a blog focused on education and information about the tide pools and rocky shore environments along the coasts of the world’s oceans. With more understanding and enthusiasm, these important ecosystems can be sustainably explored for science, curiosity, and appreciation of their beauty.
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