Robert's Ramblings

Yesterday I took a set of images from Edithburgh specifically experimenting with shooting into the sun. Please excuse the backscatter, no cleaning up has been done.

More photo's from the 'Edithburgh Sun Shots' dive can be found here at Edithburgh Sun Shots (Facebook Album) or my slideshow on Flickr.

Until the next post, take care out there and keep diving ( if that's what you do! ) ...Robert

Photo: Robert Rath, Leafy Seadragon, Edithburgh. Please ask if you want to know more about how this image was taken.

My first recollection of Sausage Jellies is seeing masses of them washed up on our local beaches resulting in them being squished through each other's hair, thrown at each other as in snowball fighting and generally not appreciating what they really were. We thought at first they were some strange jellyfish that seemed to have no sting. Soon someone started a rumour that they were really eggs, but eggs of what?

Well the rumours turned out to be true and indeed the Sausage Jelly is a blubbery mass of thousands of eggs of either the Conical Sand Snail Polinices conicus or the Sordid Sand Snail Polinices sordidus. These little snails are responsible for the very familiar sight of cockle shells washed up on beaches with neat little holes drilled in the side. The Sand Shell is predator and hunts these bivalves, attaching themselves to some poor cockle, drilling a neat little access hole with a rasp-like tongue and devouring the poor little critter now defenceless from attack.

This photo of a Sand Snail egg mass was taken last week while diving at Pt Noarlunga. This Sausage Jelly floating in the water presented the perfect opportunity to capture its beautiful form and show off the individual eggs distributed through its mass in way not seen in one simply washed up on a beach.

More photo's from last week's dive can be found here at Sigma 15mm FE First Tryout (Facebook Album) or my slideshow on Flickr.

Until the next post, take care out there and keep diving ( if that's what you do! ) ...Robert

Photo: Robert Rath, Sand Snail Egg Mass, Pt Noarlunga. Please ask if you want to know more about how this image was taken.