Keith Hiscock, Sarah Fowler, Greg Lingard, and Esther Hughes surveyed the granite boulder intertidal community at Gannet's Rock, Lundy. The aim of the survey was to re-survey the place where L.A.Harvey had surveyed in 1949. Gannet's Rock was reached by Lundy Islands RIB (driven by Derek Green) which departed from Landing Bay. After the Gannet's rock survey, the survey team also noted some species found at Devil's Kitchen.
Description of site surveyed: A broken shore of granite bedrock with some very large boulders that created cavities and extensive areas of overhanging rock. Smaller boulders were present between bedrock and boulders that could be turned to investigate underboulder communities. There were a few pebbles. There was a basalt dyke that ran across the shore towards low water. The shore exhibited a âclassicâ zonation from yellow and grey lichens to Verrucaria maura with Lichina pygmaea and, lower down the shore, Verrucaria mucosa. Littorina neritoides were frequent in the V. maura zone and amongst Chthamalus montagui further down. The shore was a âlimpet-barnacleâ shore but with some large patches of Ascophyllum nodosum (with Polysiphonia lanosa), extensive patches of Cladophora rupestris especially in âwet placesâ and patches of Fucus vesiculosus around midshore level. Toothed topshells Phorcus lineatus were frequent overall but abundant in clusters. On the lower shore, Laminaria digitata was the characterising species with L. hyperborea in the sublittoral fringe. (Alaria esculenta and L. ochroleuca were looked for but not found.) The low spring tide revealed only Echinus esculentus and Marthasterias glacialis as sublittoral species.