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DUN DUN DUN DUNNNN! Hello everyone and welcome to Littoral Hard Rock Stadium for this year’s Superb Owl Limpet LIVestream—brought to you by Lottia Farms!
Lottia gigantea owl limpets have been putting in the work, clearing the field of all their adversaries and are now ready to reap the rewards of their impeccable defense at the line of scrape-age!
We join presenters Emily and Patrick midway through the hours-long timeout owl limpets take at low tide. Secure beneath helmet-like shells, owl limpets ready their rasping radula tongue to lick and scrape at algae up and downfield, back and forth and inches at a time with their signature creeping ground game.
With surrounding stands cleared, owl limpets return to their posts in their personalized rock scar locker to regain home-field advantage, leaving behind rows of zig-zags on the turf you can follow back to the limpets’s regular onside position—usually a first down-coast bite of evidence of limpet line-backers.
Owl limpets should be flagged as key players in the intertidal ecosystem, clearing out intruders from their neutral zones and promoting a diversity of playmakers. They’re known for tackling barnacles and pushing them out of bounds, roughing the kickers and creating open paths for other rushers to touch down.
In the Big Game Of Life, owl limpets need the help of you the viewer to perform at the highest level. Though you won’t see commercial fishing for them here in California, they are a popular snack for amateur foragers. Because owl limpets start out male and become big mommas later in life, harvesting the largest limpets may decrease the size of local limpets and potentially lower their population over time. Make shore you know where your Marine Protected Areas are and what the rulings on the field may be for your area!
And now, back to the action on the field— and it appears that we are heading for a 0-0 tie in Q1. Gripping action! We hope you’ve enjoyed this Superb Owl Limpet LIVestream and all of the football puns we marine bio nerds writing this were able to squeeze in during regulation.
Thanks for watching everyone, we will sea you again soon at the Monterey Bay Aquarium!
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