Reports of marine wildlife from all around the British Isles, with pollution incidents and conservation initiatives as they affect the flora and fauna of the NE Atlantic Ocean

21 & 23 November 2012
Strandings of the Sunfish, Mola mola, are always less frequent on the North Sea coasts than off the south and west coasts for this oceanic pelagic traveller. However I have received reports from both Old Hunstanton on the west coast of The Wash and from Sandilands beach in Lincolnshire. 

"I was out walking the dogs late morning yesterday on Sandilands beach in Lincolnshire, which is about 5 miles south of Mablethorpe and 13 miles north of Skegness. It was a wet day and there was a high tide and the sea was choppy with the wind coming from the south east.  Jimmy enjoys searching for fish in shallow water but I think even he got a shock when he came across such a large fish.  It is 28 inches in length, 18 inches deep at the widest point and exactly three feet from dorsal fin tip to lower fin tip.  I estimate that it weighs about 5/6 stone.  The fish which I later identified as a Mola mola (Sunfish) appeared to be newly dead.  The pictures show that it has a couple of cuts on its body.  I have never seen one before and I understand that it is rare to find these fish in the North Sea."
 

30 October 2012
A silvery sea bream (Sparidae) called a Bogue, Boops boops, was caught off Penlee Point, south Cornwall  (near Plymouth). 
This warm water fish is rarely seen in British seas reaching its most northerly point of distribution in the English Channel where this schooling fish appears as a vagrant.

27 October 2012

A large baleen whale was spotted by Ilay Cooper, (author of Purbeck Revealed), at Rope Lake Head, Purbeck, Dorset, beneath the vertical shale cliffs. He discovered the 13.6 metre (44.6 ft) long carcass whilst walking along the shore at low tide. Its inaccessible location and the position of its head and blowhole made it difficult to identify. Dorset Wildlife Trust’s marine conservation officer, Emma Rance, believed it could be a juvenile Fin Whale, Balaenoptera physalus, which would be a first discovered on a Dorset shore. 

27 September 2012
A Boar Fish (or Zulu Fish), Capros aper, was discovered by Nigel Mortimer washed up dead on the shore at Salcombe, south Devon.

BMLSS Capros aper

FORUM NEWS

Marine Wildlife of the North-east Atlantic Ocean Mailing Groups

Marine Wildlife of the North-east Atlantic Ocean 
Yahoo Group
New Group: http://uk.groups.yahoo.com/group/Glaucus

British Marine Life Study Society
facebook Page:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/glaucus/

This Wall is now working properly and members can now post on it. This is designed for quick less important chatty news items. Photographs can be uploaded quickly which is only possible on the Yahoo Group by going to the web page. 

Images can be uploaded to flickr.
http://www.flickr.com/groups/glaucus/

Wet Thumb (Marine Aquariology) Forum Link
 
 
 

Lots of marine wildlife reports from Shetland on facebook Photographs include undersea, sea mammals and birds.  Click on the image to connect

Photographers submitting pictures should indicate if they wish them to be considered for inclusion as confirming permission takes work and time and can delay publication of the news bulletins. 
 

Click on the album for more links (On-line link)

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This is a book about an ocean that vanished six million years ago: the ocean of Tethys, named after a Greek sea nymph.  The oceans are important to climate and environment, and therefore to life on Earth. The story of Tethys is also a story of extinctions, and floods, and extraordinary episodes such as the virtual drying up of the Mediterranean, before being filled again by a dramatic cascade of water over the straits of Gibraltar. 

Dorrik Stow
300 pages, 15 b/w illustrations and maps.
Oxford University Press
ISBN-13: 9780199214297
 
 

by Paul Kay & Frances Dipper 
£19.95 incl. p&p
Soft cover

With 256 pages and numerous photographs supported by drawings, this book is the most comprehensive photographic guide to marine fish currently available in the UK. Published for the Marine Conservation Society with support from the Countryside Council for Wales. 

Click on the image to order this book through the Marine Conservation Society

RECOMMENDED PURCHASE *****

July 2010

PS: A second revised edition of the book has been published. 

SEASHORE SAFARIS
 
 
 

Publisher: Graffeg
Publisher's Review (click on this text)
Review by the City and County of Swansea

This is the book I should have written (and I dare say a few others as well) and is a much needed introduction to the world of the seashore and the hobby of rockpooling. It is a photographic guide to most of the common species encountered which is much appreciated as newcomers and even experienced rockpoolers will try and match up what they have seen to a visual image (and photographs work better than line drawings) and this will usually get them the correct species, (unless there are two very alike species and then you will need a specialist identification guide like the Collins Guide to the Seashore).

However, the seashore is a rich and interesting habitat with a myriad of species and 225 pages of this large pocket guide are comprehensively covered to suit the enthusiast.

Extract from the foreword by Keith Hiscock:
"Being able to names to what you see and, better still, to use your observations to add to our knowledge about the natural world is what this book is about."

But the book for a popular audience is more than this. It starts from the assumption that the parents and teachers and older children are unfamiliar with the seashore environment.

RECOMMENDED PURCHASE *****

Not just a cookery book: you have to go down to the shore and catch or collect the food yourself. The 240 page hardback book (with an index) is exceptionally well produced in quality of the binding, paper as well as the quality of writing, information and clear useful colour photographs. It is well organised into nine chapters:
 
 

Sharks in British Seas Richard Peirce 138 pages, colour illustrations, line drawings, colour & b/w photos. Lots of newspaper reports. Publisher:  Shark Cornwall Softcover | 2008 | £9.99 ISBN: 978-0-955869402

Seashore by Lucy Beckett-Bowman Consultant: Andy Horton Usborne Publishing   £3.99 Usborne Beginners Series Level One (very young children) ISBN 978-0-7460-8864-7 BMLSS Notes for a Primary School Teacher

Whales & Dolphins
of the European Atlantic
The Bay of Biscay, English Channel, Celtic Sea and coastal SW Ireland
by Dylan Walker and Graeme Cresswell
with the illustrations by Robert Still
WILDGuides  2008
£ 12.00 (includes standard UK P&P)
ISBN:  978-1-903657-31-7

This is the second fully revised and updated edition of this comprehensive guide to the identification of whales, dolphins and porpoises (collectively known as cetaceans) in the European Atlantic. Until very recently, most researchers and whale-watchers were unaware of the great variety of cetaceans that can be seen so close to the shores of western Europe. Indeed, it is only during the last decade, when detailed cetacean surveys have been carried out in earnest, that we have discovered how important this area is for cetacean biodiversity.

This field guide describes all of the 31 species of whale, dolphin and porpoise that have occurred in the European Atlantic.
 

BMLSS Cetacean Book Reviews

 
 
 

Seashore (Collins New Naturalist) (Paperback) by Peter Hayward Collins 2004 ISBN:  0-00-220031-7 Amazon Web Site

Paperback. Pp 288. Colour & b/w photographs, illustrations, charts, maps and bibliography. Fine copy. "New Naturalist" Seashore is a comprehensive, authoritative account of the natural history of the seashore.
 

BMLSS General Guides
BMLSS Advanced Guides