October 20, 2005 – menagerie

We've remarked before that the South Loop footbridge is a good place to see Lined Shore Crabs, and this otter has made the same discovery.

It dove repeatedly, and repeatedly came up with a small crab that it quickly crunched down.

I encountered this little (maybe a foot long) gopher snake in the middle of the trail. It didn't seem inclined to move out of the footpath, so I dropped a stick on either side of it to alert future hikers.

When I dropped the second stick, it got all rattle-snakey – it coiled up and gave a couple of head strikes. Not very convincing, actually.

Lots of variety today. A large number of these orange jellies happened to pass the mouth of Elkhorn Slough at just the wrong time – the beginning of a 6-foot incoming tide. Dozens of them washed all the way up to the railroad bridge, into Parsons Slough, up into the South Marsh, and a few even made it under the footbridge into Rookery Lagoon – ot the ideal spot for a pelagic jelly. This is the same species of sea nettle (Chrysaora fuscescens) that are featured in the big window at the Monterey Bay Aquarium's jelly exhibit.

Talk about camoflage. Imagine trying to locate this insect in a field of dead grass.

I've seen a few of these caterpillars recently. Best guess: a Garden Wooly Bear (Arctia caja), larva of the Garden Tiger Moth.


If there's a more skittish bird than a Kingfisher, I haven't encountered it – they make it awfully hard to get close. They don't like being disturbed, and they let you know it. This is one of a pair that patrols the Rookery Lagoon from the pond to Cattail Swale.