Playing Pontoon

Ok, so it's been a very long time since I last played Pontoon and nowadays I'm somewhat rusty regards the rules. But once upon a time I was very good at it. Thankfully for me, the pontoon I was involved with today was of the floating type that boats moor up to and nothing at all to do with playing cards.

There's a glass-bottomed boat that runs nature trips from Kyle of Localsh, just across the Skye Bridge from me. I've never been on it, but looking at a few images on their website I think I ought to book myself on the 2hr cruise and grab the best underwater window with an eye to seeing lots of fish. The boat has gone off to spend the winter elsewhere, and the pontoon itself is currently being dismantled and taken away for cleaning and to mend some knackered brackets. Or so the guys in hi-viz jackets told me. They certainly seemed curious regards why I wanted to walk along an empty pontoon, but soon lost interest when I told them I was looking at the animals growing on the underwater sections. "Aye go ahead, just don't fall in" was the sage advice from one of them. Cheers fella, I'll certainly bear that in mind...

I didn't take a pic of the pontoon itself, so here's one I lifted from their website

Now imagine it without the boat, handrail or red floats

I wandered a little way beyond the bend and then concentrated on the landward side of the pontoon, figuring I was far enough offshore to be in the 'interesting' zone and on the sheltered side to help me see through the rippling water surface. I don't know if it really did make any difference where I positioned myself, but in the fifteen minutes I lay belly down looking into the watery depths I certainly saw quite a lot of life. Sadly all of it destined to be jetted, scraped and chemically doused within the next few days. I shall definitely have to check a bit earlier in the season next time. I wonder how long it takes for a decent aquatic fauna to develop, a few months at least I guess.

As mentioned in the last post, I now have my brand new camera, so no more ropey phone pics, huzzah! Unfortunately I hadn't gotten around to attaching the wrist lanyard and I was so paranoid about dropping it into the depths on its very first outing that I didn't dare put it below the water surface. Such a coward. So, although some of the pics I took turned out ok, the vast majority were of blurry surface ripples and reflections.

I don't really know what these are!

Crops from the above two images

The upper looks like some sort of communal worm, but I suspect they may in fact be a Tubilipora bryozoan in an upright growth form. They are very small, whatever they are. The lower is a hydroid, I know that for sure. I'm relatively happy it is Coryne pusilla, although I can't be certain it isn't Coryne eximia. I think it's the former though. I wasn't expecting to collect any samples, so didn't have a pot with me. I think I'd need to microscopically check a few more details before confidently naming this hydroid. One for next year, when the pontoon is back and has been recolonised! 

Of the blurry-type of image, I managed these two which show an intriguing-looking sea squirt. I have no idea of the species involved. Maybe if I'd have put the camera into the water... 

Erm..?

Best of all though were quite a few of these seaslugs, and a lifer for me too! 

These are the barnacle-munching Onchidoris bilamellata

This is Onchidoris bilamellata, otherwise known as the Rough-mantled or Dusky Doris. I think I'll stick with the scientific name. It was quite frequent on the pontoon, often just a few centimetres below the water surface and not at all bothered by having a camera pushed almost into its face. I hope these drop off and back into the water once the pontoon is lifted out to be cleaned. Onchidoris is number 6839 on my PSL and one of only four Mollusc lifers this year (a terrestrial slug and two species of oysters being the other three). 

The guys in hi-viz jackets were quite clearly watching me, doubtless wondering if I was in fact bluffing about being a naturalist and was in fact a full-blown lunatic. I wussed out and quit before they called the harbour police or somesuch. "See you next year then" I merrily said as I passed them by. "Er, righto" came the puzzled response.  

I popped into a nearby shop for food and Red Bull. I do sometimes wonder if I should be sponsored by Red Bull, and suddenly realised I was parked next to a wall covered in flowering Ivy. There were a few calliphorids floating about the blossoms, but I didn't have my net with me so they survived unscathed. Presumably Calliphora vicina or vomitoria, those are the two common bluebottles up here. What I was more interested in were the mature buds. 

Mature buds on the tips of young shoots. That's important, apparently.

These are no good - too mature and already flowering

And why the sudden interest in Ivy buds, I hear you ask? Well, because the local BSBI Recorder has been approached with a request for mature Ivy bud pics from this part of the world. It's a bit of a complicated story, but in a nutshell there's a guy who is looking at bud shape as a possible way of differentiating between Atlantic Ivy, Common Ivy and garden cultivars. Which in itself doesn't sound particularly complicated, but there are an indeterminate number of races and hybrids and backcrosses of the ivies in Britain and nobody, it appears, has much of a clue as to where they all are seeing as ivy taxonomy is a bit up in the air. 

More (potentially much more) of ivies and their buds in future posts. Always leave your readers on a cliffhanger....

Male Episyrphus balteatus sunning on a Japanese Knotweed leaf

This is probably Scathophaga furcata, also on Japanese Knotweed.