THE TIDE POOLS
You can see now why tide pools are like undersea gardens.
Strawberry Anemones live in colonies. Do these tiny, sweet sea creatures look like a carnivores to you? Not only are they vicious meat eaters, they can clone themselves! (Clicking to enlarge gives a better view of their delicate, hairy tentacles.)
This Anemone's ghostly appearing tentacles are soft as a rose petal. If you glide your fingers across them, you hardly feel anything at all. But if you let your fingers linger, it grabs you ever so softly with tiny suction cups embedded in its many "hands." Good thing human fingers weren't on the menu that day!
Its pebbly pedal disc or basal column (upper left) looks like chain mail.
Whomever the scientist naming this creature was, he named it because of its resemblance to the terrestrial garden variety! Eye of the beholder and all that...! This is its mouth.
No longer called "Starfish," because they aren't a "fish"; they are an invertebrate echinoderm (related to sand dollars and sea urchins), now called Sea Stars. Makes sense to me.
Some species have been known to live for up to 34 years.
Yes, I left my polarizing filter in the car -- s'cuse the murky shots of the submerged creatures! And, in some cases the water was moving. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it!
