As part of the current Marine ID course I’ve been running around trying to get together photos of some common seaweed for part 2… Unfortunately the local coastline is not at all hospitable to seaweed, the extensive mudflats of Morecambe bay are good for molluscs and worms, but offer few attachment points for the larger algal species (I think the phytoplankton might be a fascinating study – but that would be a bit outside the current remit!).

Never the less, I took my camera down to the beach at the weekend for the MCS walk from Warton Crag and round Jenny Browns Point by Silverdale (Saturday 24th April).

Here there is some hard ground, allowing seaweed to get a hold. Highest up the rocks appeared Blidingia (filamentous green stuff) and small amounts of Ulva intestinalis (fatter tubular green stuff), followed by Pelvetia canaliculata (channel wrack), at the base of the sequence was Fucus spriralis (spiral wrack) – beyond that stretched the mud as far as the eye can see…

The complete sequence was over in about 30cm of height – so extremely truncated!

Thanks to Hilary for organising the walk (my feet have almost forgiven me!)

“Day 44: Still stranded with nothing but empty water as far as the eye can see”

More truth in this cartoon than a page of words. Enjoy! (View full size).

Thanks to Michelle Cooper of Lancaster Maritime Museum for a very beautifully illustrated talk on the river Lune through Lancaster (Wednesday 11th March 2010). Lots of views of activity on the river over the last 400 years, which got everyone in the audience judging how things have changed. The images used to illustrate the talk were from the Lancaster City Council collection. These will be on display at the Maritime Museum until the 11th April 2010. For more information:

Tales from the riverbank

The competition is part of the celebration of the silver anniversary of the Lancaster Maritime Museum. Photographs on the COAST theme – from shipwrecks to sandy beaches – are invited. The best entries will be displayed in the Exhibition Gallery.

For further details, including PRIZES, please see the entry form below:

Coast photo competition entry form. (300kB PDF)

by Charlotte Caffrey MSc. FRGS

An exploration of the wildlife, marine life and scenery of Spitzbergen, Greenland and the Antarctic Peninsula.

This is a special event organised by the Preston Society (The Preston Bird watching & Natural History Society) to mark their 3000th. presentation/lecture!

At: 7.30pm on Saturday 28th 27th November, 2010
Location: St. Mary’s Church Hall, Cop Lane, Penwortham, Preston PR1 0SR

Tickets costing £3.50 each available through the Preston Society – full details in the form linked below:

The arctic and antactic – booking form (corrected)

The three categories this year were Above water, underwater and humerous, and the winners, declared by popular vote at the meeting on the 10th of February were:

Above: In the above water category, Greenland sea ice, by Chrissie Ryan.

Above: In the underwater category, Scorpionfish by Lewis Bambury.

Above: In the humerous category, Fish head by Chrissie Ryan.

Report on the MCS walk 30th January: The Ribble Way walk between Longton and Penwortham (Preston) is an interesting route. While the land is flat, we walked on the raised levees, which protect the surrounding land from the river Ribble, and so had excellent views over the river and inland. Wildlife included several large flocks of geese, cormorants (one pictured) and a couple of hares.

Thanks to Hilary for organising a very enjoyable day out!

MCS AGM report. The National AGM came north to Preston this year, just a few days after the long-awaited completion of the Marine and Coastal Access Act. This finally opens up the possibility of statutory marine reserves around the UK, so there was considerable satisaction, though there is still a long way to go to implement effective protection for habitats and species ‘on the ground’.

Something that came from the meeting quite strongly was the feeling that we need to broaden our constituency. We need to be able to show that the state of the seas around us is of concern to more than just a few eco-warriors!

Recently in-store polling work by the Co-Op has shown that you do want to look after marine wildlife. Clearly the state of our seas effects everyone living in an island nation! This collaboration with the Co-Op is now coming together in the ‘Your Sear Your Voice’ campaign. This gives you the opportunity to support the establishment of marine reserves in your area. (See below for further details).

AGM was on 17th November 2009 at the Foster Building, UCLAN.

We had an interesting walk today around Walney, with some great weather and light. Thanks Gordon for organising.

I couldn’t help but notice how much plastic rubbish there was though, hardly a meter without any. I didn’t think I was that old, but I can remember as a child when on a trip to the beach you didn’t see tons of plastic. In fact, like most children, I was a real beachcomber, picking up shells, dead crabs, rocks, bits of wood etc. I would have noticed.

Anyway, for anyone interested, I’ve put some pictures on my web pages here.

It was not the most promising of days – a small group of walkers for the MCS joined over 500 walkers for Galloway’s Society for the Blind in heavy rain at Arnside on Saturday morning (15th August 2009). The forecast was for brighter weather later – so we hoped that would be the worst of it, and looked forward to arriving at a sunny at Kents Bank!

The great column of walkers set off on time, but soon snaked out over a mile. We gathered for a sandwich, and to let everyone catch up, just before walking out onto the sands proper at Far Arnside. Everyone had just about dried out from the earlier rain when we arrived at the Kent’s channel. Due to the numbers we crossed the channel in two waves – this prevents people following too closely after each other, which can result in the sand liquefying under the last people to cross. Those of us in the second wave watched with some trepidation as the waves broke over the waists of some of those crossing. Just as the second wave started to cross, the rain came down again, so we were soaked from the top and the bottom simultaneously! The water lever was deeper than anyone we spoke to could remember on a walk before, and rumour was that there had been some debate between the guides about turning back. In the event we all made it across safely – though soggily!

Finally, the better weather that had been promised arrived, and we were only a little damp by the time we reached Kents Bank, and finished drying in the sun in the Albion’s beer garden on our return to Arnside.

Thanks to everyone who took part in this years Cross Bay walk, all proceeds go to MCS’ Seas Fit For Life campaigns. Thanks also to Cedric Robinson, the Queen’s Guide, and to his very helpful team of assistants on the sand.