English marine life

My favourite examples of marine life in England

The Blonde ray

Able to grow to a length of 120 cm,weighing 14.3 kg on average with a lifespan of up to 15 years the blonde ray is identified by its diamond shape with small black spots all over its back that extend to the back of its wings along with a scattering of white spots, not to be mistaken for a spotted ray which has no spots extending to its wings. Due to their large size they usually feed on cuttlefish and sand eels with a variety of small crustaceans and mollusks. They are widespread but listed as near threatened by the IUCN red list. The English Channel is an important breeding ground for the blonde ray so preserving this habitat will be key to their, and many other species, survival. These little buggers are a difficult to find yet common explorer of the waters around the British isles due to their natural camouflage making them hard to spot yet they are a sight to see with their interesting diet of crustaceans and cool pattern of black and white spots over their “blonde” skin. They are certainly not the nicest looking yet they are certainly an interesting species.

The Compass jellyfish

Able to grow its bell up to 30 cm across it is a translucent yellow jellyfish with 16 brown markings around the fringe and atop the bell which resemble a compass with v shape radiating out from the central point. They have frilled oral arms below the bell with 24 long thin marginal tentacles around the fringe of the bell arranged in 8 groups of three they also contain the jellyfish’s sensory organs, theses are used to catch their prey which are commonly small fish and plankton making them carnivores.

They are widespread and commonly found on the south and west coast mostly with some sightings on the north coast of Ireland and the Isle of Man. They are under no special conservation status. These blobs of weirdness are just cool, no other word for it, they have an odd pattern, an odd “structure” and jellyfish in general are just odd, which is just brilliant.