Habitat2Habitat - Rock pools

A big shout out to Cathy - one of our panel Goddesses, who was recently injured in a nasty little car crash - the tracks are dedicated to you.

The collective nouns of the week - a herd of seahorses (course I've heard of seahorses) and a flotilla of swordfish - both quite descriptive.

So why does the hammerhead shark have such a weird shape ? University of Hawaii have done some research into this, and they reckon that is is just a larger aerial to sweep a larger area in the use of their electromagnetic sensors.

People with nothing better to do (Peter wrote that - Anth thinks this should say Maritime Archeologists) have mapped every square foot of the bottom of the Hudson river through New York. They found a bunch of things that were a surprise - like some scuttled revolutionary era ships, and a large, man made structure that must be about 3000 years old - probably built by the Native Americans as that was the last time the river was at that level.

The first of a new series - Rock pools are made in two ways - soft rock next to hard rocks and the soft stuff eroding, or sand and pebbles getting trapped in a small hole, and then the act of the sea using the pebbles to erode the pool further - over geological time (not a summer).

The pools low to the tide tend to be the most diverse, and the ones high up are much less diverse because of the change in environment over the tidal cycle.

At the bottom you will find sand - full of little slater like creatures (isopods), worms, crabs, urchins, and algae. On the wall (especially up and under them), you will get coloured algae, sponges, sea squirts, bryo's and anemones (Anth recommends kissing them - or at least getting your aunty to do it)). The fish that you see in the pools are of two types - the travelers (like flounders) and those that live there (like blennies).

A few other locals are the blue ring occy (DO NOT TRY AND KISS OR TOUCH), the sea stars, and crabs.

The lip of the rock pool is a bit boring - because that is where the water rushs in and out - not a good place to live.

The rock pools along the Mornington Peninsula (esp Sorento back beach) are favorites, along with the ones by the surf lifesaving club at Angelsea. In the bay, check out Ricketts Point.

Victorian Environmental Assessment Council (formed in Jan 2002) is a member council, with people with backgrounds in catchment management, the rural economy and watery things.

The Council process is interesting - it is to provide strategic advice on the management of the environmental impacts and protection with regard to public lands to the government. It takes about 18 months to work though the process of assessment and consultation, and provide a report back to the Minister.

Angahook-Lorne state park is currently the largest protected area in Victoria that is not a National Park. The reference was extended to the Otways around the time of the election.

Public submissions close on the 28th April so if you want to have a say about this follow the link

"Sunday Shining"

"Underwater Love "

"Visions of You"

Smoke City

Grand Theft Auto