Carpinteria Tide Pools
Carpinteria Tide Pools
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- A bright green anemone sits alongside red algae in the tidepool
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- A tiny jellyfish, trapped in the tidepool, pulsates aimlessly
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- This creature (Hermissenda crassicornis) is able to perform a neat trick – it moves the stinging cells from its favorite food – hydrozoans – to the fleshy appendages on its back for protection. The eaten stinging cells are not digested, but instead moved to the tips by way of the brown digestive gland which can be seen extending into the appendages.
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- Clams are filter feeders. The open “mouth” in this photo is actually the siphon of a very large clam embedded in the rock. There are two closed siphons alongside it.
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- A child investigates an ochre star (Pisaster ochraceous) during low tide
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- A Pacific rock crab (Cancer antennarius) – these are all over the rocks and in the pools during low tide – you just have to look carefully!
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- Hermit crabs are arthropods, and they carry their skeletons on the outside of their bodies. But their back half is soft, meaning they must borrow a hard shell to protect it.
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- A tidepool sculpin (Oligocottus maculosus) hides among ochre stars and anemones
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- A close-up view of the skin of an ochre star. Sea stars are echinoderms, which means “spiny-skinned.”
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- This little fish got trapped in the pool, and snagged not once, but twice, by two different anemones.
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- The Kellet’s whelk snail (Kelletia kelletii) is among the largest gastropods on the central California coast. These snails are voracious predators. This one is surrounded by sunburst anemones and ochre stars.
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- Pelicans, gulls, egrets, and more eagerly comb the rocks as the tide recedes, looking for a quick meal
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- Hermit crabs have soft hindquarters, making borrowing a shell a necessity for survival
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- Swirling sand makes for harsh conditions in the tidepool
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- An octopus curls up inside a tiny cup in a rock wall during low tide.
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- Nudibranchs feed on hydroids, sponges, sea slug eggs or sea slugs, sea squirts, pieces of fish, other mollusks and sometimes anemones and barnacles. All are carnivorous and feed on a wide variety of animals. The Opalescent Nudibranch (Hermissenda crassicornis) is one of the few cannibalistic species of nudibranchs.
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- Spanish shawl nudibranch, found in the tidepool at Carpinteria State Beach
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- The Spanish shawl nudibranch (Flabellina iodinea) is easily one of the most beautiful of the tidepool denizens.
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- Ochre stars (Pisaster ochraceous) come in a variety of colors – orange, purple, red, brown, and even pink! Here are several clustered in a tidepool with sunburst anemones (Anthopleura sola)
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- This stalked tunicate (Styela montereyensis) is a chordate, meaning it has a primitive spinal cord. One of its siphons is open. Behind it is Phyllospadix, also called surf grass.
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- A Pacific rock crab (Cancer antennarius) hunkers down in a tidepool at Carpinteria State Beach, next to a sunburst anemone (Anthopleura sola)
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- Ochre stars (Pisaster ochraceous) come in a variety of colors – orange, purple, red, brown, and even pink! Here are several clustered in a tidepool with sunburst anemones (Anthopleura sola)
