To help you make the most of your marine activities and Springwatch this year, we've decided to tell you a little more about the species which if you're lucky enough you could encounter on your adventures!

Remember, some of the information can be used in the activities themselves, such as the rockpool ramble, who am I game and much more.

And, remember to tell us what you do and see!! 

Email us at marine@wildlifetrusts.org to share your adventures with us.

Basking sharks
This gentle giant is the largest fish to be found in the coastal waters of the British Isles. Measuring anything up to 12 metres long, and weighing up to seven tonnes, it feeds on animal plankton, filtering 1,000 to 2,000 cubic metres of seawater per hour to extract its tiny prey.

During the summer months, it favours Cornish, Devon, Manx, Irish and Scottish waters as its regular feeding grounds.

The basking shark is an internationally recognised endangered species with legal protection.

The Wildlife Trusts have been surveying basking shark numbers in UK waters for many years and, in November 2008, published a report ‘Basking shark hotspots in the UK’. Further information can be found on The Wildlife Trusts’ basking shark project website.

Manx Wildlife Trust dedicates much time and effort to monitoring basking shark numbers and behaviour, and is always interested to hear about sightings from members of the public. Its website is packed with information about basking sharks, and the best way to spot them.

If you would like to help with basking shark monitoring in the south west, Cornwall Wildlife Trust is looking for volunteers for its Seaquest Basking Shark Project.

Image © JP Trenque

Grey and common seals
The grey seal is the largest British marine mammal breeding on land. UK coastal waters are vital to the survival of this species with more than half of the global population living here. They are found in their largest numbers along the Scottish coasts and islands.

The common seal is smaller than the grey, with more ‘cat-like’ features, a more rounded head, with large eyes and a whiskery mouth. They are found along the entire east coast of the UK but not along the south or western coasts.

40% of the global population are found in the UK. Common seals give birth to their pups from February. The grey seal begins giving birth from November onwards.

Both species will haul out onto land, whether rocky outcrops or a sandy beach. Here they can be seen in large numbers, though it is important not to disturb a seal colony, whether watching from the shore or the water. Startled seals can injure themselves or mums can be separated from pups in the panic to flee.

The Solent Seal Tagging Project, a partnership between the Wildlife Trusts' South East Marine Programme and Chichester Harbour Conservancy (CHC), has been working with the Sea Mammal Research Unit (SMRU) at St Andrews University, to deploy their latest tracking devices. The tags provide information on seal diving behaviour. Five harbour seals living in the Solent have now been fitted with these tracking devices and their secret lives are now being revealed!

Grey seal © Sue Sayer

Harbour porpoises
The harbour porpoise is one of six species of porpoise, yet the only one found in UK waters. It is one of the smallest ocean mammals and, as its name implies, tends to stay close to coastal areas or river estuaries. It is a shy animal, which rarely leaps - or at least not when you are watching!

Despite its quiet nature it is the most commonly sighted cetacean – the scientific name for all whales, dolphins and porpoises – in UK waters. Although some places are better for seeing harbour porpoises than others it can be seen from all shores – so keep your eyes peeled!

Harbour porpoises have a small triangular dorsal fin, which gives them away – that, and the rounded face with no beak makes them different to the bottlenose dolphin which people are most familiar with. The harbour porpoise tend to be seen alone or in small groups of two or three individuals. When feeding, however, they can be seen in larger groups, often in association with diving gannets.

The North Wales Wildlife Trust is looking at the distribution and habitat use of harbour porpoises in North Wales. The project involves year-round land-based surveys of porpoises around the coast of Anglesey with boat-based surveys during the summer. For more information and to find out how you can get involved, click here.

Image © Colin Speedie

Bottlenose dolphins
Bottlenose dolphins are the most common and well-known members of the dolphin family and, whilst they could be found through UK waters, they reside in the Moray Firth, in Scotland, in Cardigan Bay in Wales and in the English Channel, with a small group in the South West of England.

Bottlenose dolphins live in groups – pods - which on average, have about 15 dolphins. Group size can vary from single animals to more than 100 or even occasionally over 1,000 animals! These are called super-pods.

Pods often work as a team to catch fish, but will also hunt individually, using cliffs, the seabed or the surface of the sea as a barrier against which the fish cannot escape. In order to find and catch fish dolphins use a system called echolocation, similar to sonar. Dolphins emit clicking sounds and listen for the return echo. This determines the location and shape of nearby items, which can include fish but also helps them to find their way around!

Bottlenose dolphins are very playful and can be seen bowriding boats and leaping clear of the water!

Devon and Cornwall Wildlife Trust jointly run a programme called Seaquest – which asks you to report your sightings of dolphins, amongst other sea creatures, to enable the programme to understand more about where dolphins in the South West go and how many there are.

Devon Wildlife Trust also runs a recording network, which asks for volunteers to regularly look out for dolphins from certain locations. To find out more, click here.

Image © Gavin Black

Gannets
Gannets are large black and white birds, with long pointed wings and long bills. Northern gannets - which we get in the UK - are the largest seabirds in the North Atlantic, with a wingspan of up to two metres.

Gannets hunt fish by diving from a height into the sea and pursuing prey underwater. Gannets have a number of adaptations which enable them to do this; they don’t have external nostrils but do have air sacs in their face and chest, under their skin which act like bubble-wrap, cushioning the impact with the water. And their eyes are positioned far enough forward on their face to give them vision – like us - allowing them to accurately judge distances.

Gannets can dive from a height of 30m, achieving speeds of 100 km/h as they strike the water. This enables them to catch fish much deeper than most birds.

The UK is home to the most important nesting ground for Northern gannets and about two thirds of the global population – found mainly in Scotland and the Shetland Isles. The biggest Northern gannet colony is in the Scottish islands of St Kilda; this colony alone comprises 20% of the entire world's population. Bass Rock in the Firth of Forth is also famous for its large gannet population.

Image © Lissa Goodwin

Leatherback turtle
The leatherback turtle is the largest of all living sea turtles. It is the only one which we know visits our waters intentionally, rather than making an error in their navigation, or being cast ashore here in bad weather. We occasionally get tropical species of turtles visiting our shores, but as they cannot survive here, they are often rescued and flown back to their warmer home for release.

The leatherback can easily be told apart from other sea turtles by its lack of a bony shell. Instead, its body is covered by skin and oily flesh. This turtle prefers deep water but are most often seen within sight of land.

Whilst we know leatherbacks do not breed here, they do visit to feed on jellyfish, which we have in abundance. Leatherback turtles can dive to depths as great as 1,280 metres!

Like all sea turtles, leatherbacks start their lives as hatchlings bursting out from the sands of their nesting beaches. As soon as they hatch, they are in danger. Many are eaten by birds and other animals before they even reach the water. Once they do reach the water most are not seen again until they are adults – the teenage years of turtles are a mystery!

Image © Sea Watch Foundation

Rockpool species

Hermit crab
The common hermit crab is a seasoned traveller. It carries its mobile home with it wherever it goes. It uses discarded and unused winkle, topshell and whelk shells as its home and slides its body into the shell cavity, using its legs to walk around with the shell on its back. If threatened, or picked up, the crab will retreat into its shell for protection; only re-emerging when it is sure the coast is clear!

There are a number of different types of hermit crab, growing to various sizes – as soon as a shell becomes too small the crab hunts around for a new larger home. Look out for any shells which appear to be moving quickly across rockpools – you can be sure that there’s a crab beneath them!

Image © Paul Naylor

Edible crab
Found all over the UK on rocky and mixed shorelines, the edible crab has a heavy, oval shaped body. It is easily distinguished from other species by its ‘Cornish pasty’ appearance and massive black-tipped pincers. It is reddish-brown in colour. Very large individuals can have a shell width of up to 25cm, although most only typically grow up to 15cm.

Image © Paul Naylor

Common starfish
The common starfish is perhaps the one which most familiar. It is usually orange, but may be pale brown or even violet. They grow, on average, to 10-30cm in diameter. Not only can they re-grow their arms, if lost, but also their stomach! When eating a scallop or mussel, the starfish regurgitates its stomach out through its mouth and stuffs it into the shell of its prey, having prised the shell open with the suction power of its arms. It digests the prey into a seafood soup before re-swallowing its own stomach, meal and all!

Image © Paul Naylor

Common prawn
If you look closely at the transparent common prawn you will see it has red/brown stripes across its body and rather groovy yellow and brown striped legs and claws! It tends to look quite snooty with its upturned rostrum (nose), and its bulbous eyes on either side of its head, give it an almost alien appearance!

It walks delicately across the seabed, scavenging for tiny food particles and, if you approach gently and slowly, it may even give you a manicure by cleaning out your nails!

Image © Paul Naylor

Beadlet anemone
The beadlet anemone can look like a red wine gum stuck to a rock! It shows its full glory when in a rockpool, or submerged by the tide. The anemone then extends all of its 192 tentacles into the water, preparing to catch any passing prey. It is found on most rocky shores on hard substrates covered with seaweed or in crevices where it won’t dry out at low tide. Look closely and you may see the bright blue spots found around the top of its column.

Image © Joan Edwards

Common dog whelk
In amongst the limpets and barnacles on the rocky shore, you’re sure to find the common dog whelk – a voracious predator! It feeds upon barnacles, limpets and even mussels, using its coarse tongue to effectively drill a hole through the protective shell of its prey to expose the flesh beneath.
You may have seen limpet shells on the shoreline with a tiny perfect hole in them – sign that a dog whelk may have been at work!

The dog whelk shell is usually up to 3cm in height by 2 cm broad but may reach up to 6cm in height. The shell colour is variable, usually white, but may be grey, brown, or yellow, occasionally with contrasting (usually brown) spiral banding.

Image © Paul Naylor 

Tompot blenny
With almost perfect camouflage the tompot blenny can elude even the keenest of rockpool ramblers. It may only be the passing of your shadow over the rock pool that prompts this little fish to dive for cover.

Of course, if it has already found the perfect hiding place then all you may see is the head poking out from a rocky crevice. A characteristic fish, the blenny, like others in the same family, feeds upon a variety of animals from the seabed, using a single row of sharp teeth to consume its prey. If you fail to see this beautifully coloured fish within the rockpools, you may come across a shanny in its place. They are more common, although timid in comparison to the inquisitive tompot.

Image © Paul Naylor

Blue-rayed limpet
On a low tide, if you head down to the edge of the water, you may find the beginnings of a band of seaweed called kelp. This is a large seaweed which is attached to the seabed by a holdfast – a kind of above ground root system which wraps itself around the rocks and boulders. From the holdfast arises a long stem, which splits into a series of large flat blades. If you look very closely amongst these you may glimpse a sparkle of brightest, neon blue!

This is not part of the kelp; rather it is a type of limpet, only found on kelp – the blue rayed limpet. It feeds on the kelp, leaving small oval depressions in the blade. As the limpets grow larger, they move down the stem towards the holdfast, where they establish themselves by excavating a depression. This can weaken the holdfast, eventually resulting in the seaweed being dislodged by storms - you may find seaweed on the shore with the blue-rayed limpets still in place.

Image © Paul Naylor