…..come in all sizes, according to ecologist Pip Jollands, who gave Coastwise members a refresher on shells that can be found on the shore. This is to help the survey process, with members getting back to the shore after a long lay-off.
The shells, such as Topshells, Periwinkles and Whelks are easy to find on the shore, but can be difficult to identify precisely.
They have interesting features, such as a hard radula, or tongue, to scrape algae off the rocks that they browse on.
The Dogwhelk has a particularly nasty method of feeding – by drilling a neat hole into, e.g. a mussels shell, injecting a chemical and eating the resulting mush.
So, it's a dogwhelk eat dogwhelk scene down at low tide…….
No YouTube video here, I'm afraid.
Driller Killers…….