Egg ID

[kelpmermaid]

I saw something new today, diving locally off of Palos Verdes. On a few rocks, I noticed what appeared to be eggs laid in an orderly fashion. They looked like white pumpkin or watermelon seeds. I saw them in more than one location. Does anyone have any idea what id could have been?

 

[drbill]

Did they look like the attached picture? If so they are Kellet whelk eggs. They are having the time of their lives now (asnd for the past few weeks), forming mating aggregations up to about 20 and laying clusters of those capsules.

Each one is actually a capsule containing up to 1,000 individual eggs.

I was in the Park today and found eight whelks mating at 75 feet and got some really nice video of them with my new light. Haven't created any stills yet from that footage and all my others are on another computer at this moment so these are the only pix I have.

Dr. Bill

 

[kelpmermaid]

That's it! Thanks, Dr. Bill! Thinking about it, I even said on the ride back to the dock that I had noticed a lot of them. I think I saw more Kellet's whelks yesterday than I ever have in total. Of course, it could be that I just took more notice of the "hidden" and smaller things because the viz wasn't good.

PS. Was that your shot of "dueling sheepheads" in CDN? What a display of teeth!

 

[PhotoTJ]

Didn't know the species, but I've been seeing those things everywhere the past couple of weeks.

 

[kelpmermaid]

I think the shape of the shell is just beautiful. There are some good pix available on the www.divebums.com website, including an egg laying shot, now that I've had time to click around.



http://www.divebums.com/FishID/Pages/kellets_whelk.html

The eggs really look like salted pumpkin seeds.

 

[drbill]

Yes, it is time for this species' annual orgy. I've been seeing them all over Catalina the past month or two. Since they will be the subject of one of my upcoming newspaper columns, here's a collage showing an adult, whelk feeding on Tegula, whelks mating and a whelk laying egg capsules.

Dr. Bill