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Floating sea foam

No one likes to arrive at the beach to find a layer of sea foam on the shoreline, in the waves, or further out behind the breakers – especially if it is a disconcerting brown or yellow colour! Foams, however, are global in their presence in the aquatic natural environment including on streams, rivers, lakes, READ MORE

Fish are friends not food

Water covers 71% of the worlds surface, and 97% of that water is in the oceans. Oceans, while appearing infinitely large, are not an infinite resource. Oceans provide many important services and functions, most of which people may be unaware of, such as: nutrient recycling, primary production, provide shelter to many marine species, provide food READ MORE

Swift, spirited seals

It is surely now widespread knowledge that at the base of Robberg Peninsula on the protected bay side there is a very large breeding colony of cape fur seals Arctocephalus pusillus pusillus. They are a charming species, whose antics in the water and on land can keep me entertained for hours, despite being noisy and READ MORE

Bryde’s Whales forever in the bay

While most people excitedly anticipate the arrival of the humpback and southern right whales sometime during June or July their migration from sub-antarctic waters, many may forget or overlook our near shore resident species, the Bryde’s whale Balaenoptera brydei. Both the humpback and southern right whales are bigger in size, personality, approachability, and visibility than READ MORE

The hermaphroditic skinheads of the sea

While doing some research on fish occurring in local waters, I came across a most fascinating and odd looking species that I had to know more! The poenskop Cymatoceps nasutus looks like it could play the role of a gnome or troll in a movie as it does not age well! Poenskop is the Afrikaans READ MORE

Mussel-ing in on our coastline

Mussel is the common term for a variety of fresh and salt water clams or bivalve molluscs. Bivalves, as the name may suggest, are enclosed by two shell halves, and mussels are no different. Most of the species to which the term mussel applies have shells where the length is longer than the width giving READ MORE

Not one, but three, abalone species in Plettenberg Bay

If someone mentions abalone, it brings to mind one specific marine gastropod mollusk (sea snail) species Haliotis midae, also known as perlemoen. In fact, in Plettenberg Bay, there are 3 abalone species living in intertidal and subtidal waters. The most well-known abalone species is perlemoen, while the species most often found washed up on beaches READ MORE