Rocky shore
Rocky shores are found where the sea meets the land and many support a very diverse combination of plants and animals. Constant wave action, along with the rise and fall of tides, make these shores a tough place to live. Thus, all organisms have acquired various adaptations to survive this habitat’s unique conditions.
The sublittoral zone is almost always covered by water and thus much more stable than the intertidal zone above it. Temperature, sunlight exposure and water pressure remain reasonably consistent. There is a large range of animals and algae here and they are not adapted to exposure in the littoral zone. But, some animals come in at high tide as predators of littoral species, for example; carnivorous fish, crabs and starfish. In the sublittoral zone of the rocky shore transect the most dominant species was the sea squirt or Cunjevoi – Pyura stolonifera. Given this zone is only exposed for a very short period at low tide, the Cunjevoi are usually covered by water and their lifestyle is mainly a marine one. Species are however, exposed to the air, the sun and the winds for a short period of time. The sea squirt pumps a large amount of water through its body whilst under the water and then filter out the food. They then store this water during low tide, which is why they squirt when stepped on. This adaptation means they do not dry out during the period of low tide.
The middle zone of the rocky shore, also known as the intertidal zone, is usually covered and uncovered by the tide at least twice a day and there is an abundance of light, oxygen and food. There is some shallow water and the wave action oxygenates water and stirs up plankton as food. The light causes coral and reefs to form which generate more...
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....21), light (739) and also has a higher pH (6.5) and water retention (very fast) than further up the dune (0.00, 27, 3.5 and very slow respectively). The plant species with the best representation in this zone was the beach spinifex – Spinifex longifolius, a tough, spiky grass. Spinifex roots go down approximately 3 metres and generally develop from the same nodes as the shoots so that each has its own water supply. The spiky leaves contain a lot of silica which makes them rigid and stiff. Plants such as the spinifex act as obstructions and reduce the surface speed of the sand carrying wind. This results in sand being deposited around them. Once some vegetation cover has developed a wider range of plant species is able to colonize the dun. The reduced wind movement together with the shade produced by the plants lowers the rate of evaporation from the sand surface.
Limpets are a sessile species (Sessile animals are usually permanently attached to a solid substrate of some kind) which are abundant on rocky shores, as they are rich in algae (their primary food source) and spend most of their time clinging to hard substrates or bare rocks. They are capable of withstanding water velocities in excess of 20 ms−1 (Mark W. Denny and Carol A. Blanchette, 2000) which imposes large hydrodynamic forces on the limpet. Limpets can accomplish this b...
Longshore drift influences the deposition and erosion of sediments. Waves erode the coast and transport the eroded material along the coastline. Over a period of time, the material will be deposited on a beach or form a larger feature such as a spit. Groynes are structures built at equal intervals along the coastline. Their purpose is to restrict longshore drift, preventing coastal erosion.
3. Etnoyer, Peter, Nelsen, Chad, Ranker, Kevin. “Beach Sand at the Base of the Food Chain.” “Surfrider Foundation.” 2 December 2004.
Garrison, Tom. "Chapter 12: Coasts." Oceanography: An Invitation to Marine Science. 7th ed. Cengage Learning, 2010. 319+. Print.
Soft corals such as sea fingers and sea whips, are soft and bendable and often resemble plants or trees. These corals do not have stony skeletons, but instead grow wood-like cores for suppor...
Surfers, swimmers and sunbathers use beaches for recreation. People fish off beaches for food. Since many people take their vacations at the beach, lots of beaches in tropical locations are important to their country’s economy. Entire cities, regions and countries depend on the money tourists spend while visiting the beach. Beaches are naturally very dynamic places, but people try to control them and build permanent structures, such as houses, restaurants, shops and hotels, on or near the shore. The natural erosion and deposition of beaches becomes a problem. Beaches con disappear over time, or even over night during severe storms. Beaches are areas of loose sediment (sand, gravel, cobbles) controlled by ocean processes. Most beaches have several characteristic features. First are offshore bars, which help protect beaches from erosion. Next is the foreshore, which rises from the water toward the crest of the next feature; a berm. On low-lying shores, dunes form behind beaches. Dunes look like rolling hills of sand and are blown into place by the wind. New, smaller dunes are often changing shape as the wind continues to affect them. Waves and currents move the accumulated sediment constantly creating, eroding and changing the coastlines.
The world’s coral reefs are quintessential to global biodiversity, so much so that they are often referred to as the "rainforests of the sea". Although their actual space occupied by reefs is relatively small, constituting less than 0.1% of the world's ocean surface, they support over 25% of all marine species on earth. They provide complex and varied marine habitats that support a wide range of other organisms including, but not limited to, fish, mollusks, worms, crustaceans, echinoderms, sponges, tunicates and other cnidarians. Some of these animals feed directly on the corals, while others graze on algae on the reef. The reef also provides a protective habitat for many of these animals.
The Great Barrier Reef is home to a remarkable number of organisms. The coral itself is made up of the skeletons of tiny, flowerlike water animals called polyps, held together by a limestone substance produced by a type of algae. Hundreds...
Coral reefs are limited to where they live. Most live in the narrow band of the equator, as they need light, the shallow near shore areas is where most coral reefs can be found. Their biological riches, though, hold value far beyond their beauty. After tropical rain forests, coral reefs may be the most biologically diverse ecosystem, holding a substantial portion of the basics of life on the planet. They form what is thought to be the most species rich ecosystem in the oceans, the crucible of life some 3,000,000,000 years ago. Covering just 0.17% of the ocean floor, an area the size of Texas, coral reefs are home to perhaps one –quarter of all marine species, earning them the title “the tropical rain forests of the Oceans.”
At the Aquarium of the Pacific, many different oceanic habitats are presented. These exhibits give the public an idea of the different environments our own oceans hold, providing a hands-on learning experience in the comfort of their own city. The two habitats that interested me are the coral reef and deep ocean. Both the coral reef and deep ocean are very different from each other, having varied ways of survival for the plethora of plants and animals that call those places home.
[9] Deep sea and extreme shallow water habitats: affinities and adaptions by Franz Uiblein, Jorg Ott and Michael Stacowitsh 1996
The Great Barrier Reef is an exemplary model of the famous exotic coral reef seen in a copy of the National Geographic or the popular animated film Finding Nemo. Located on the coast of Australia, it is known as the “largest biological organism in the world” (“Human Impact on the Great Barrier Reef” par. 1). The idea bears that coral reefs are again not an assortment of organisms functioning separately but rather working together to thrive. The groups of coral that are seen in t...
... incredibly relevant to today world. Brine shrimps are also used as test subjects due to their incredible resilience, and are also sold as a novelty item “sea monkeys.” Unfortunately, these unique critters have become threatened in some cases as water is diverted away (for human use) from high saline environments inhabited by brine shrimp. As a result, the water becomes more saline and usually results in a rising pH which can endanger the shrimps. The information provided in these two studies shows the need, function, means, and genetic explanation for osmoregulation. As humans continue to impact the environment, changing salinity will result in changing need for osmoregulation, and as a result, future scientists will need to explore how organisms can react to the need to osmoregulate more or less and how that will impact organism populations’ survival as a whole.
In many parts of the world, ecosystems’ temperatures begin to rise and fall to extreme levels making it very difficult for animals and plants to adapt in time to survive. Climate has never been stable here on Earth. Climate is an important environmental influence on ecosystems. Climate changes the impacts of climate change, and affects ecosystems in a variety of ways. For instance, warming could force species to migrate to higher latitudes or higher elevations where temperatures are more conducive to their survival. Similarly, as sea level rises, saltwater intrusion into a freshwater sys...
Yamada, K., & Kumagai, N. H. (2012). Importance of seagrass vegetation for habitat partitioning between closely related species, mobile macrofauna Neomysis (Misidacea). Hydrobiologia, 680(1), 125-133.