Atlantic Sunrise
At night, the sound of the ocean is lonely. The sound of it, heard from the campsite, makes me think of vastness and infinite spaces and loneliness. At sunrise, the human scale returns. I shared the beach with this strange creature, which the ranger told me was a tunicate and is actually a whole colony of small creatures living together. It's called sea pork. When the waves roll over it, it shrink to the size and shape of a small avocado. Such a sight!
1 comment:
Hey, I used to be a nature center specialist out on Hunting Island. I love it there! During my stay I learned a lot about the local marine animals. I'm sorry to say but the ranger that told you this was a sea pork is wrong. What you actually saw is a sea cucumber!
Sea pork is a hard and rubbery blob, and is a colony of animals called "Tunicates". Because the animal you saw shrank and reformed itself into the shape of an avocado when the wave hit it means it was not sea pork, but rather a sea cucumber- which is related to sea urchins, sea stars, and sand dollars.
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