South West Ramblings 17

Nigel Marsh & Helen Rose · Issue 88, Jan/Feb 2016 · pp. 73–80

Products mentioned: Nikon D7100, Nikon D300, Subal ND7100, Subal ND20, 10-17mm FE zoom, 2x Teleconverter, Inon Z240, 60mm micro lens, 105mm micro lens, Green Water Magic Filter

I think that I have mentioned before in my previous scratchings that we should not ignore estuaries as an alternate habitat which can offer many imaging opportunities of different or juvenile subjects not seen on the open water reefs. I am fortunate to have both the Fal and the Helford estuaries close to my home which provide a range of habitats, the Helford being notable in particular for eel grass, including one habitat that is quite unique and only appears at a few locations around the UK coastline. You may not be too familiar with Maerl, a form of calcified or coralline seaweed, as it needs quite specific conditions to thrive, but both estuaries and some parts of Falmouth Bay, extending to Nare Head in the east and the Manacles reef in the west, do offer the right conditions. Maerl is a Breton word (sometimes written maërl) and if you did not know better you might mistake it for smal…