Introduction

The Rocky Intertidal Experiment

Life History

Taxonomy

Morphology

Reproduction

Works Cited

Glossary

Picture Gallery

Contact Information

Benthic- Organism that resides primarily in/on a substrate (Lerman, 1986).

Carcinus maenas- The green crab that was introduced to North America within the last 200 years

Desiccation- Extreme loss of water.

Ephemeral- short lived (Bertness, 1999).

Eneteromorpha- A type of green algae that L. littorea love to eat.

Epiphytes- Organisms that live on the surface of plants and seaweeds (Bertness, 1999).

Intertidal- The area that is exposed to the air between tides.  It is right at the boundary between sea and land and is often called the littoral zone (Castro and Huber, 2003).  The rocky intertidal is in reference to the rocky shores found in Nahant.

Planktonic- Developing in the water column while feeding on other planktonic organisms  (Bertness, 1999).

Radula- The scraping tongue of gastropods, chitons, and octopods (Bertness, 1999).

Quadrat- An arbitrary area of a specific shape (determined by the scientist) used to obtain a random sample.  In this experiment I used a quadrat of 0.5m².