So what can Gabriola fish do?
The BBC reports that a stingray fish was seen using tools to solve problems. What hidden talents do you suppose Gabriola fish have? Do we have tool-using fish here, too?
Archive for the 'sea creatures' Category
Much more about jellyfish
Have you watched Gabriola’s jellyfish drift past, and maybe even seen the moon jellyfish in tidal pools at Whalebone and Sandwell? Have you wondered at them, and wished to know more? Off to the NYT, then, to read Much More to Jellyfish than Poison and Plasma. Fasacinating.
Filed in sea creatures 2 Comments so far
Grey whales swimming near Gabriola
Rare grey whale sightings off the northern tip of Gabriola Island have created a stir in the past week. The sightings have been off Orlebar Point, which juts out into George Strait near Berry Point. That’s from this article on the Nanaimo Daily News site. And, as the article points out, somebody has posted a [...]
Filed in Gabriola Island,sea creatures Comments Off
Whale song trends
The whales you see swimming past Berry Point might be more musically inclined than you’d guess. From sciencemag.org: Whale ‘Pop Songs’ Spread Across the Ocean. Music mania is sweeping the ocean, and all the young male humpback whales are in on the latest trend. A new study reveals that, just like humans, humpback whales in [...]
Filed in sea creatures Comments Off
Whales may be astronomers
If you’ve watched whales swim past Gabriola, you might be interested to know that some of them may be migratory astronomers. Well, who knew? Wired reports: An eight-year project that tracked humpback whale migrations by satellite shows the huge mammals follow uncannily straight paths for weeks at a time. The results suggest a single migratory [...]
Filed in sea creatures 2 Comments so far
Biodegradable golf balls: better for Gabriola beaches?
I’ve found crazy numbers of golf balls on Gabriola beaches in the last few years, and have already mentioned why I worry about golf balls on the beach: what happens when birds and sea creatures eat those golf balls? And even if the golf balls aren’t eaten, they don’t biodegrade, do they? But wait, here’s [...]
Filed in environment,Gabriola Island,sea creatures One Response so far
B.C. killer whales choking on boat exhaust
Turns out that whale-watching tours are even more damaging to whales than we’d thought. The Times Colonist reports: B.C. killer whales choking on boat exhaust. B.C.’s endangered population of southern resident killer whales face serious health issues from the exhaust emissions of pleasure and whale-watching boats, a study by a Victoria zoologist has found. [Source: [...]
Filed in environment,sea creatures Comments Off
Gabriola valentine
Here’s a valentine for you from the sea, Gabriola. It’s a clamshell, wedged into the sand and eelgrass at Whalebone Beach. (You’re supposed to think it’s heart-shaped.)
Filed in sea creatures Comments Off
Sea urchin teeth
What, you’ve just come home from peering at sea urchins at Drumbeg? Betcha didn’t think of their teeth, did you? From Science Daily: Ever-Sharp Urchin Teeth May Yield Tools That Never Need Honing. To survive in a tumultuous environment, sea urchins literally eat through stone, using their teeth to carve out nooks where the spiny [...]
Filed in Gabriola Island,sea creatures Comments Off
How smart is the octopus?
When you sit on the rocks at Orlebar Point, do you wonder who’s under the waves, and what those creatures are doing? Well, here’s more to wonder about. From slate.com: How Smart Is the Octopus?
Filed in Gabriola Island,sea creatures Comments Off
On octopus brains
Do Gabriola’s octopuses have distributed minds? Maybe. Consider this article from Harvard Science: Thinking like an octopus. If you were an octopus, would you view the world from eight different points of view? Nine? The answer may depend on how many brains an octopus has, or, to say it another way, whether the robust bunches [...]
Friend of jellyfish?
At the end of a Gabriola summer, we often find dozens of jellyfish washed up, dead, on the beach. These are Lion’s Mane jellyfish — the kind you hope never to meet while you’re swimming in the sea. They’re dead already when we find them on the rocks at Whalebone, right? So I took out [...]
Filed in Gabriola Island,photos,sea creatures 4 Comments so far
Drumbeg sea creature
OK, beach-prowlers. What do you suppose this is? The photo was sent to me by a Gabriola blog reader who hopes you’ll know. Apparently the creature is about 9 inches long. Ideas?
Filed in Gabriola Island,photos,sea creatures 7 Comments so far
Today’s Gabriola fish
This is the dog’s most recent catch – a flat fish at Whalebone. Is it a flounder? It’s about 8 inches long, and all grey and boring on the other side.
Today’s Gabriola jellyfish
Here’s one of the jellyfish I see around Gabriola quite a bit. It’s a clear jellyfish, with four pink sections inside. Last year I showed you the same kind of jellyfish floating in a tide pool at Whalebone. One of these days maybe I’ll figure out what it’s called.
A challenge for Gabriola photographers
Here’s a fun game: go photograph a geoduck as it’s squirting at you. The trick is to get nice and close to get a good shot, all while keeping the camera dry. This photo isn’t too spectacular. Can you do better? I know that some of you Gabriola photographers are way better than I’ll ever [...]
Filed in Gabriola Island,sea creatures Comments Off
Gabriola sand creature
Well now, all you marine biologist types — what’s this? I suspect that this brightly-coloured creature changes quite a lot when the tide comes in. (There was a link here to additional photos of the creature.) Guesses? I wonder if it’s some kind of sea anemone, though it doesn’t look much like the anemone some [...]
Small but mighty
We did nothing to this crab – honest! He was just strolling along a Gabriola beach, looking for a fight. Or so it seemed, anyway… claws aloft and all. This is one of those tiny crabs. You wouldn’t happen to know what they’re called, would you?
