So, one of my esteemed colleagues at the California Academy of Sciences-Dr. Rebecca Johnson Rodgers, who has worked with the Echinoblog while teaching at San Francisco State,is currently out on the Farallon Islands with the Rocky Shore Partnership monitoring various intertidal invertebrate critters. So, I wanted to give them some bloggy love:Click here for their blog...
For those who are not familiar, the Farallon Islands are some remote islands, about 27 miles outside the Golden Gate Bridge (outside of San Francisco Bay).. Here is the Wikipedia page for the Farallons for more..
But the short version is, that they are remote islands that are protected as a wildlife refuge. The Farallons are great for birdwatching and have lots of great (hopefully still...) pristine intertidal reef habitat.Plus, as a bunch of rocky islands out on the outskirts of San Francisco Bay, you get lots of this...
Along with many of the classic California invertebrate fauna..
Leptasterias "hexactis", shown here with brooding eggs!! This is part of the Leptasterias species complex which I have written about here and here
and, of course, the good ol' workhorse starfish Pisaster ochraceus, which I will be writing up in the blog later THIS WEEK!!!
and just because they're so dang beautiful...these mollusks too!!! This used to be called Tonicella lineata, but I think the name's been changed recently...
....and back in the Paleozoic when I took Intertidal Ecology, this thing was called Calliostoma, but I gots no idea what the kids are calling it these days!
GO check out the Rocky Shore Partnership BLOG and I'll be back in a few days with some PISASTEROUS starfishy goodness for all o' y'all!
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