Perranporth | An Bollenessor

Storm Darragh raged over the UK last weekend – which by itself was not great, apart from the fact that there was a chance interesting stuff had washed up on the beach! As the winds came from the North, we drove to the long beach at Perranporth on the north coast to have a look. It was nice to get sandblasted for a bit and admire the furious crashing waves and icy blue-grey sea. Find of the day was a dead Grey Triggerfish (*Balistes capriscus*), a generally more southern species that is increasingly observed in the UK. Some other finds in the gallery below (shot with an iPhone; which is actually a lot easier than changing a wide angle for a macro lens on a wet, sandy beach!). Among the finds, Goose Barnacles, a Small-Spotted Catshark eggcase, an unidentified blob and a cuttlefishbone of the Pink Cuttlefish (*Rhombosepion orbignyanum*).

After a day on the beach on the south coast of Cornwall this Sunday, we heard that a Sperm whale Physeter macrocephalus had stranded at Perranporth on the north coast. We quickly drove there and make a long trek over the beach to see it. The 40 foot (13-14 m) female had just died (beached whales usually die quickly). A post-mortem has been conducted to try to establish a cause of death (see here). There has been a recent mass stranding of Sperm whales in the North sea (see here for a very good overview article, including a map). The recent UK strandings all involved young males who often travel together, and probably got disoriented travelling south into the shallow funnel that is the North Sea. However, females are usually confined to the tropics and so this stranding is unlikely to be related. It was a very sad sight to see.