Mermay 2022

Dune walked along the beach, ocean waves occasionally lapping against his feet as they sank into the wet sand at the water’s edge. The beach was covered in lots of shells, all being washed up by the foamy waves, though he was on a different mission than shell collecting today. The tidepools were finally in sight after a long walk, their rocky outcroppings jutting into the tide as it receded. Low tide was beginning and would allow Dune plenty of time to explore the pools revealed by the waves. He was determined to look for starfish today, hoping to see at least one since it had been a while since he’d actually seen one. Many anemones squished beneath his steps, squirting water out with each careful step. Dune slipped on some gloves he kept in his small hip pack, and began to walk on all fours to keep a better balance. He began to climb on the dark grey rocks, finding many small crabs of varying species, muscles, small fish and eels, and even some barnacles, but no starfish. He carried a small camera in his pack and took a few well angled photos of the creatures he did come across. He continued to explore the new areas revealed by the tide as it continued to recede. It had been about two hours of exploring when Dune finally felt a familiar pang in his stomach. Lunch time. He found a relatively dry section of rocks to sit down and eat for a bit. The brown froad’s lunch was relatively small considering his pack could only hold so much, but it suited him well. It was when he was packing up his trash, he dropped his whole pack. He managed to grab it before it fell into the large pool below his rock, but it also drew his attention to the bright orange creature tucked up under the very rock he had been sitting on. Its five arms clung tightly to the rock as it sat completely upsidedown beneath Dune. He almost dropped his pack a second time in his scramble to make it back up the rock to work his way down safely. Once down, he was able to look at the beautiful starfish up close. The orange body with white dots moved slowly, curling its arms around the underside of the overhang. Dune took a few photos before looking around that area some more. The large pool was about the size of a small cart in both width and depth. Many creatures roamed about their lives as Dune watched quietly from above the still surface of the water. A dark purple shape caught his eye as he followed a crab walking towards the opposite side of the pool. Another starfish! This one was a deep purple with accents that looked almost red, with many of the white bumps the other sported. Dune snapped a few pictures of that one too, enjoying some of the angles he was able to get, even getting a rare shot of the underside of the starfish as it moved to the sandy floor below to head towards a nearby urchin. The tide had started to return, so Dune took that as his queue to leave, working his way back to the sandy part of the beach quickly. The day had been more successful than he thought it would be and he was so excited that he was able to see what he’d come to see. Dune considered coming back for the next few days to see what changed in the pools between the tides. He could do his own little research bit on the tidepools here, he thought, and maybe look into joining some kind of local research team. Maybe sea exploration was the calling he’d been looking for these past few months.