Blog Post #9- Shannon Point

The most interesting organism that I saw in Shannon Point lab was Hermissenda Carssicornis. It is a extremely special sea slug of brightly colored. Its characteristic is many orange stripe on the body. This is the most beautiful sea slug that I saw in my life. I think this organism’s ecological role is being a food source for other organisms and eat Sea anemone, plankton and smaller sea slugs.

This organism is Pacific sanddab, and we found it on the boat. Pacific sanddab is a interesting fish, both eyes are on the one side. When I picked it up carefully, the sand dab seemed like standing on my fingers. The eyes side is dull light brown, mottled with black. The ecological role of Pacific sand dab is food source and preys smaller fish and octopuses.

I saw this Sea Pen from the lab. The Sea Pen was static state in the water, I didn't see it moving. I think the ecological role is being a food source for other organism.

The crab in the bottom left hand corner is Cancer Gracilis, also known as Graceful rock crab. The carapace and its legs are purple. It was my first time saw a purple crab. The crab clip my finger when I caught its back to take it out from the basin. Fortunately, I didn't get hurt. The ecological role of this crab is being a food source and prey parasites.

This trip to Shannon Point was very interesting and widen my views of marine ecology. The field trip showed many different species of marine organisms, most can't discover on land. That was the most interesting field trip. Moreover, I really understanding the important of biodiversity and Ocean acidification after the field trip. I didn't hear about Ocean acidification until last week. It made me concer about high content of carbon dioxide and Ocean acidification after the Shannon Point field trip. 

If  the Ocean acidification is constantly severe  in the Pacific Northwest, will the organisms in the Pacific Northwest migrate to other place or extinct?