A Giant Among the Rocks
A Giant Among the Rocks
by
Rob Read
At this time of the year, I have often found myself spending a few days on the Isles of Scilly. This beautiful archipelago situated of the southwest tip of Cornwall often provides stunning October weather, acting as a welcome extension to summer. Those that have been reading the blog for a while will know how much I love the islands, and how they have provided some of my most memorable wildlife experiences. I have shared the thrill of my dolphin encounters recently.
The Isles of Scilly are home to some amazing marine life and the rock pooling is simply incredible. Its shores are teeming with life – turn over a boulder in a rock pool and the life sheltering beneath is jaw-dropping. One could spend a lifetime studying the wide variety of creatures that call these tidal pools home – I don’t think it could ever become boring.
Above: A Giant Gobi ©LABETTA Andre/Shutterstock
Anyone that knows me will also know my fascination with fish. I spent a lot of my childhood and early adult years sitting beside rivers, lakes, and ponds trying to catch the monsters I knew to be lurking in their watery depths. Trips to the coast were always a good excuse to spend hours peering into rock pools where I would often see small fish darting for cover as my outline appeared over their temporary tidal prison. Occasionally I would be lucky enough to catch one in one of those pathetically inadequate nets that decorate many a pavement outside the shops of seaside towns. Most of these piscatorial rockpool inhabitants were various species of small blenny and gobi, species no less fascinating for their diminutive size.
Perhaps in a future blog series I will introduce you to some of the more common species you can expect to encounter on your own coastal adventures. However, something sparked my memory this morning to recall my encounter with Britain’s largest species of gobi, the aptly-named Giant Gobi Gobius cobitis.
It is quite a distinctive-looking fish with a broad mouth, thick-set body, and short tail. It has a ‘pepper and salt’ speckling to its greenish to brown colouration, perfect to help it hide among the rocks and pebbles of the seabed. It can reach up to 27cm in length and is found in the intertidal zone up to a depth of around 10 meters. I came across it in a rock pool on the island of St Agnes which held a healthy number that were easy to tempt out of their watery home on a small handline. To my shame I didn’t photograph it, but what a privilege to see and hold such a beautiful fish and a true rockpool monster.
Rob Read. October 2021.
