Blog Postings

The postings will be introductions to each of my life lists. The lists themselves will appear in the side margin. I shall do some postings about particular localities and there will also be postings to provide updates every time I add a new species.
Please note that I am not qualified in any aspect of natural history - there will therefore be occasional (or, apparently, in the case of the hoverflies, a lot of) errors.

Saturday, 17 September 2011

Astropecten irregularis


 I came across a few new species of things during my Scottish holiday this year but by far the best was the starfish Astropecten irregularis.  I may have seen it before but failed to recognise it.



We rescued this one from an exposed piece of hard sand at Gairloch and placed it on some soft sand in which it buried itself in less than 30 seconds.





Posted by at
Labels:

3 comments:

  1. Helen17 September 2011 at 19:39

    Wow that's incredible. I've never seen a live starfish.

    Was the sand you put the starfish on to be covered by the next tide or can they stay in wet sand for longer? I had previously assumed that they couldn't survive out of the water and that was the reason for there being so many dead ones on Formby Beach.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Scriptor Senex17 September 2011 at 19:59

    They are quite happy in wet sand until the next tide covers them, Helen. Whether they can last longer under the surface without a tide coming in I don't know.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Helen18 September 2011 at 09:53

    Thank you. I shall have to keep an eye out for live ones when I'm next at the seaside.

    ReplyDelete

Welcome - comments are nearly always appreciated (the exception being those that simply advertise which don't make it past my moderation so please, don't bother).

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)