Why Chiton?
During the class trip to Spittle Pond I noticed something interesting about chiton. If you look at the pictures below you can see that the algae/bacterial growth on the chiton mantle and dorsal plates matches the composition of the tide pools the respective chitons are in. I wanted to research this observation further to see if there was a correlation between chitons with algae growth on their dorsal plates and their movement to and from algae filled tied pools with similar and dissimilar algae growth .
However....due to time constraints, an inability to remove chiton from the rock surface, an inability to mark chitons with b-tags/nail polish, and vicious high tides (My camera broke from one of the splashes, and I was nearly rammed into the rocks about 5 times.) at the tide pool gradient studied at, I was unable to pursue this observation, and so it was back to the drawing board.
I knew that I wanted to study the relationships between chiton and algae so instead I decided to focus on a more feasible question...
The Question To Be Answered
"Are chiton more likely to stay in tide pools with high algae diversity and are they more likely to not stay in an area of low algae diversity? "Intrigued? Please click on the links to the right.