Article 2G17V On the shore, casualties of a winter storm

On the shore, casualties of a winter storm

by
Phil Gates
from Environment | The Guardian on (#2G17V)

Saltburn-by-the-Sea, North Yorkshire Dead man's fingers and a lumpsucker are marooned in seaweed along the strandline

At the bottom of the cliff, a two-minute walk from the high tide line, there is a small stone-built mortuary, constructed in 1881 and formerly the temporary resting place for the bodies of shipwrecked sailors washed up on the sands.

Today, by morbid coincidence, the strandline was littered with dead man's fingers, Alcyonium digitatum. These soft corals live in deep water and are usually only seen by divers, but late winter storms had cast some ashore amid heaps of kelp.

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