Garden Route

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Inter-Tidal Zone

The magic of the Garden Route coastline, lies in the fact that it falls within a region of overlapping winter and summer rainfalls, and cold and warm currents. Therefore many different types of marine creatures occur here, forming amazing communities.

The rocky parallel-slant of the coastline with small pebble amd shingle beaches is characteristic of this area, and relatively rare along the rest of the South African coast.

Creatures in the tidal region live in different zones according to their ability to withstand extreme, everchanging conditions. these include exposure to heat and cold, waves, tumbling rocks and even freshwater from rain-storms. Most of these are determined by high and low tides.

Increased demand from foreign markets has led to high value being placed on a number of these rocky shore creatures, such as abalone and oyster. This causes inevitable exploitation, decrease and even loss of animals in certain areas. Tsitsikamma National Park is a Marine Protected Area where no fishing or cellection is allowed resulting in a safe heaven where marine creatures settle and breed.

Go Explore And See For Yourself

Best time of day: At low tide. please consult the information office for safe places to explore, weather forecasts and tides.

Where: The creatures you seek are found in crevices, under overhangings and under seaweed, rocks, shells and pebbles.

How: Sea urchines, starfish and cushion stars can be touched beneath the water or observed with a mask, but please do not try to remove creatures stuck to the rocks.

Please Take Note: As most intertidal creatures are fragile, they often have sharp spines, edges or brittle hairs for defence and tend to hide under things for protection. It is therefore not recommended to climb into deep pools, where one could not only hurt oneself on the sharp rocks, but also stand on unseen creatures like sea urchines.

Take care while exploring pools to prevent slipping on wet rocks and laways face the oncoming waves.

Creatures You’re Likely To See:

Barnacles

Adult barnacles are permanently attached to the rocks and are encased in a hard shell. They feed by combing food particles out of the water with their long fan-like, hairy legs, which extend out of a hole at the top of the shell (they live upside down!).These legs are pulled into the shell through the opening and sealed by 4 shell plates, when touched or exposed to air. Although each one is bisexual, they prefer to cross-fertilise, by means of extremely long penises - up to 3x the length of an animal!

Sea Anamone

Colourful ‘sea flowers.’ anemones are hollow, sac-like animals supported by the water pressure and attached to the rocks by a sticky disc at their base. When touched, the tentacles around the mouth seem to suck onto ones finger. These are in fact, armed with stinging cells, which kill its prey, but are harmless to humans. They are amongst the first multicellar lifeforms to have evolved on earth. There are 8 different kinds of anemone to be found in our pools! Go ahead touch one, but PLEASE be gentle! Please don’t use anything other than your hands.

Cape Sea Urchin

The urchin has a round body encased in a fragile shell (also known as the pumpkin shell). covered in sharp spines. They are grazers, scraping algae off the rocks with their neak-like mouths located in the middle of the underside. Five double rows of tube feet radiate from the anus down the sides of the shell, which together with their spines, enable them to move around. They are highly sensitive to air and direct sunlight, and often use bits of shell and pebbles as sunshade ‘umbrellas’.

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