Rockpooling destination: Hemsby, March 2016

During the months of February and March the eggcases of a variety of rays, skates and catshark are washed up onto the Norfolk shores. Common eggcases that can be found include the Thornback and Spotted ray and the curly ended eggcases of the catshark. Sometimes you can find the larger Blonde ray eggcases.

A walk along the shore turned up some nice mermaid purses and lots of the bryozoan, Flustra foliacea.

Rockpooling destination: Hemsby, changing strandlines over winter months

The strandline at Hemsby has changed in composition over the last few months.
In November it was dominated by red seaweeds, by December the proportion of red seaweeds being washed up had decreased and by January 2015, the strandline was dominated by hornwrack with ever increasing numbers of  washed up ray and catshark eggcases.



The sandy shore with a strand line dominated by red seaweeds. Habitat classification: LS.LSa.St (Strandline) and LS.LSa (Littoral sand).





The strandline is comprised of a variety of red seaweeds, the bryozoan, hornwrack (Flustra foliacea) and empty razor shells.

The shore at Hemsby in Januray 2015 has changed to become  dominated by the remains of the bryozoan, hornwrack (Flustra foliacea).




A small spotted catshark (Scyliorhinus canicula) egg case.

Rockpooling Destination: Hemsby, January 2015

A strandline dominated by hornwrack still occurs on the shore but now several new things are beginning to be washed up in the strandline too. 

The most interesting are the mermaids' purses; months before skates, rays and catfish (formally dogfish) laid their egg cases among the cobbles and bryozoans and within these egg cases the embryos developed into miniature adults. As they became too large for their egg cases they broke free and the discarded egg cases drifted with the waves and currents until finally, they were washed up on the shore.

If you find a mermaids' purse why not report your sighting to the shark trust great egg case hunt?. You can find out more about submitting sightings and about rays and sharks at 
http://www.sharktrust.org/en/great_eggcase_hunt

The sandy shore with a strandline dominated by the remains of the bryozoan, hornwrack (Flustra foliacea). Habitat classification: LS.LSa.St (Strandline) and LS.LSa (Littoral sand).

The sandy shore with a strandline dominated by the remains of the bryozoan, hornwrack (Flustra foliacea)

A small spotted catshark (Scyliorhinus canicula) egg case.

A Thornback (Raja clavata) egg case

A spotted ray  (Raja montagui) egg case.

This was one of two, grey seal pups washed up on the shore that day.