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Cryptopleura ruprechtiana
Ruffled Red Seaweed, Hidden Rib
Fishboat Bay, Juan de Fuca Strait, British Columbia, Canada
23 July 2020
Collected at 10:35am PDT
Low Tide 0.7 feet at 10:42am PDT (measured at Sheringham Point Tidal Station)
Weather: Partly cloudy, no precipitation, wind SE 10 km/hour, light chop, temperature 14˚C, relative humidity 80%.
Phase of Moon: Waxing Crescent (approx. 72 hours into this phase at time of observation/collection); (Previous Phase, New Moon, 20 July 2020 at 10:32am PDT: Next Phase, First Quarter, 27 July 2020 at 5:32am PDT.)
Figure 1: Cryptopleura ruprechtiana, Ruffled Red Seaweed, held up to the light. This reveals the fine network of veins in the upper portions of the blade and the rather ‘messy’ variations of ruffles along the lower blade margins. Fishboat Bay, Juan de Fuca Strait, B.C. Canada. July 23, 2020. Photo ID 27451 ©Seaweedwhisperings.com
In situ observations:
Live seaweed observed in the low intertidal zone. Here the gradually sloping beach consists of large rounded cobbles, mainly covered by sand.
Person 1:
Delicate.
Frilly.
Disorganized/sloppily arranged.
Red to maroon in color.
Not conspicuous amongst larger seaweeds.
Shy, but not really hiding.
Graceful underwater.
Blades like misshapen hands.
Faint veins.
Irregular edges.
I’m distracted by the neighbors (other seaweeds and marine animals).
Ruffles can be quite showy.
Person 2:
At the lowest intertidal area we find your shiny rosy-red fronds.
Sunlight reflects off you – the light sparkles.
There are a few differing shapes to your blades – this can confuse one, lead one to believe you are two or three, certainly more species than just one; one, the flat lobed leaves that look like the distorted fingers of a human hand; two, the somewhat larger lobed leaves that grow many semi-circular ruffles along the edges, and three, the long simpler shaped blades (that have no ruffle trim and no lobes at all).
It took me several observations/photographs/consultations with identification resources to be certain of your identity. Issues with identity are strong in this seaweed and this shows up in the taxonomy too (many reassignments have been made of the years).
All blades are the same lovely rose red color.
At this season (full summer) you have bleached spots – off white, pinkish, even pale green, and other life forms are growing on you.
Many Ruffled Red Seaweed algae have been broken from their holds and are left littered along the last high tide line.
You grow in areas crowded with other seaweeds.
You can be easily covered over by them, almost totally hidden.
Do you need their protection somehow?
When the tide is in, you would be amongst the last to receive sunlight, growing as you do low on the ocean floor in the shade of the canopy of the much taller and larger kelp species.
Are you a bit shy?
Preferring the shade of other plants and of rocky protrusions / formations?
Your beauty is not out in plain view, but hidden and sheltered away in darker places.
I can’t see your holdfast but I think you’re anchored to a rock or large cobble that is buried under the sand.
Your texture is like thick and somewhat crisp cellophane, almost not plant-like. When I rub healthy strong leaves against each other there is a crinkly sound.
Eel grass, Feather Boa, Winged Kelp, Splendid Iridescent Seaweed, encrusting Coralline algae all live in profusion here with you – a crowded intertidal region brimming with life.
Figure 2: Growing at the base of larger macro algae, if you wander the beach at very low tide you may encounter Cryptopleura ruprechtiana looking somewhat like this – the ‘suggestion’ of pink frills contrasting amongst the browns and greens. Fishboat Bay, Juan de Fuca Strait, B.C., Canada. July 6, 2020. Photo ID 27452 ©Seaweedwhisperings.com
Figure 3: The same individual as is depicted in Figure 2 is pictured here after lifting aside some other algae and seagrasses. “Hidden Rib” is a seaweed that doesn’t just hide its rib, it tends to hide in general. Fishboat Bay, Juan de Fuca Strait, B.C., Canada. July 6, 2020. Photo ID 27453 ©Seaweedwhisperings.com
Further Observations & Impressions:
Person 1:
Looks like a decorator crab (Oregonia gracilis); looks “decorated” and the individual seaweed I was observing resembled the shape of a crab.
Clefts in leaves reminded me of crab pincers.
Very smooth to touch.
Curving scythe blade.
Blades are transparent.
Pleasant texture for chewing.
Strong iodine flavor, bitter aftertaste.
Tingling in my tongue (after chewing).
Wanted to keep chewing, no urge to spit it out.
I see a frilly dragon when I separate the seaweed out a bit.
Upon re-submerging the plant, there is a grace to its flapping motion – as if flying through the water.
Slight iodine smell.
I feel lazy; no hurry to finish my observations/interactions.
No hurry to understand more.
Not bored, simply relaxed.
“Cryptopleura” – hidden fingers.
“Ruprechtiana” – nice sounding surname.
“Ruffed Red Seaweed” – simple descriptive name.
Frilliness inhibits its and/or my ability to go deeper – there’s some kind of a barrier there.
Flexible armour – perhaps it’s a confusion-defense mechanism.
Can be distracted by surroundings, but not drawn in to investigate or understand.
Person 2 tried to find the holdfast; it was difficult to discern.
Person 2:
The look of you is very attractive to me - rosy red color and hints of a slight iridescence and sparkles of reflected light – all very different than other seaweeds nearby. This combination of qualities feels light, bright and “cheerful” to me – on the surface, at least.
Your ruffles are a delicate looking trim on the fringe of your blades.
The ruffles themselves are all themed on or variations of explorations of “the circle”.
It looks like you can’t decide which variation you prefer, so you keep on trying, making, growing new ones.
You are transparent.
I can read my notes through your blade.
Add up the layers of your blades and the ruffled edges (as happens when you’re growing in your habitat) and it’s no longer easy to see through you, but this gives you more tones and lovely variations on the theme of “red” – rosy pink shades through to maroon and burgundy.
Variation – variations on leaf shape, variations on the formations of a circle, variations on tone of the color red.
You divide and fan out moderately, like fingers of a hand, palmately, on one flat plane.
The ruffles at your edges take you into different dimensions (than that one palmate plane).
Lots of forms.
Confusing to behold.
Which one is you, Cryptopleura ruprechtiana?
Fine veins can be seen running from the base of your blade to the tips – slim, long lines, roughly parallel and not branching.
From a distance this plant is rather like some red leaf lettuces. But no lettuce is as transparent as this is.
Taste very unpleasant. Strongly bitter while chewing. Lingering taste of iodine.
I rejected you quickly from my mouth.
It looks like you don’t suffer much grazing from sea creatures either; perhaps your taste repels all herbivores.
Light reflects off your wet blades as from a sheet of glass - sparkling, shiny, and from a rosy base.
“Cryptopleura” – hidden (or somehow I think of ‘cave dwelling’) lobe / rib / membrane…? This name sounds a bit ominous - too heavy a name for such a sparkling, pretty looking plant.
“Ruprechtiana” – someone’s name? Seems to have no “fit” with the energy of this seaweed.
“Ruffled Red Seaweed” – apt description of ‘part’ of the morphology of this plant.
You live in the crypts, in the shadows and darker areas.
Are you too tender for full light, for full exposure?
Are you not ready for that?
Or are you simply doing a great job of living under the canopy, out of view, using what light is available?
You are confusing to identify.
Is your identity unsure to you?
Not yet coalesced?
It seems this may be so, as you play with form – variations of shapes and trims and circles and arcs.
You explore your own style of being.
Do you explore more widely? Try things out much beyond yourself?
It feels like you may do so, but rather tentatively.
You’re not bold; you’re more timid.
You might like to have a guide lead the way, make you feel safer.
The safety of your ‘crypt’, of being hidden, feels good.
But sometimes your curiosity has you forgetting caution. You play a bit, try things out.
You are aware there is much to learn and discover out there, out beyond...
Figure 4: A few clumps of ruffled pink Cryptopleura ruprechtiana growing at the base of the Laminaria setchellii kelp are revealed at this very low tide. Except for at these exceptionally low tide days, they’d be immersed and shaded by these large-bladed algal neighbors. Fishboat Bay, Juan de Fuca Strait, B.C., Canada. July 6, 2020. Photo ID 27454 ©Seaweedwhisperings.com
Discussion:
There is fresh new feeling to the energy of this seaweed.
Cheerful, even playful, yet easily frightened; darts back to safety. Adventuring can be fun. Dressing up like the decorator crab is just to find out what dressing up is like.
Interested, but only beginning to explore – feelings, actions, thoughts.
Attention span short – easily distracted.
Explorations are fleeting, short-lived.
Comes across as disorganized, sloppy.
The new and unfamiliar can be puzzling and easily lead to fright and retreat. (Puzzle - the ruffled trim of this seaweed has the appearance of ‘jigsaw puzzle’ pieces.)
Can “jump at their own shadow” – such is their uncertainty and their unawareness of self.
The ruffles face the world in many different angles – they catch and reflect the light in a sparkly fashion. This plant wants to reflect more light than it wants to absorb.
The light touches softly and darts quickly back into space.
In the whole of the Whispering interaction, the feeling is of naïve femininity, preteen, immature. Sparkles, fairy lights, dragons that fly, ruffled skirts, pinks and roses…
Explorations are fanciful; this seaweed’s ‘happy’ realm is a fantasy world. It seems that this seaweed could be tending more to the fanciful and the playful and the idealized, and sometimes this is not quite the best balance for seeing the true “dragons” in the world.
Circle / arc – the center of the circle is your safe place, Cryptopleura, and the edge of the arc / circle is as far as you can safely venture. Almost like the exploration has an ‘invisible tether’, like a geometric principle that allows movement only within the arc. There are endless forays “within” this safe circle. Continuing explorations, however, can eventually lead to breaking out into a new realm / way of being.
Remnants of the fantasies are abandoned, dropped carelessly in the moment; like the many pieces of this seaweed that are broken off and scattered across the beach. There is no retained memory of these explorations, they are simply abandoned.
Figure 5: The red, the browns and the green - broken from their holdfasts and washed in with the previous high tide, several species of macro alga are pictured here. The bright ruffled pinkish band is Cryptopleura ruprechtiana, and it is joined here by fragments of Alaria marginata, Nereocystsis luetkeana, and Ulva lactuca. Fishboat Bay, Juan de Fuca Strait, B.C., Canada. August 18, 2020. Photo ID 27455 ©Seaweedwhisperings.com
Returning specimens to sea:
Notable with this seaweed, was that there was the least amount of empathy / connection / farewell feeling upon returning it to the sea.
“Simple abandonment” fits perfectly.
Figure 6: Cryptopleura ruprechtiana, Ruffled Red Seaweed – a closer study of the blade and ruffle morphology. A distinguishing feature is that the ruffles rarely extend all the way to the tips of the blades; the y predominantly occur lower down and closer to the base of the thallus. Fishboat Bay, Juan de Fuca Strait, B.C., Canada. July 23, 2020. Photo ID 27456 ©Seaweedwhisperings.com
Biology & Natural History Information:
Description:
This bright, rose red to purplish red seaweed has flattened and erect, fan-shaped blades that are thin (most species of this genus are only one to six cells thick) and somewhat delicate. The blade has a distinct midrib at the base, but this quickly becomes more difficult to see in upper parts where it is replaced by a fine network of veins. These veins are often best observed if the blade is held up to the light or if light reflects off the blade in just the right manner. At the base, Ruffled Red Seaweed is anchored by a holdfast that can be either discoidal or somewhat branched. Each blade is rather deeply cleft into elongated lobes. The most distinctive feature of this species is the dense fringe of tiny semi-circular proliferations that develop along the sides of the lobes. This fringe never extends fully out to the tip of the lobes and is not even present in all individuals.
Male and female gametophytes are separate individuals in Cryptopleura ruprechtiana. Spermatia and Tetrasporangia are produced in patches along the lobe margins or in the proliferation of fringes.
Habitat:
Ruffled Red Seaweed / Hidden Rib is a bright, rose red to purplish red seaweed that commonly grows on rocks exposed to moderate surf in the low intertidal to subtidal zones (to 30 meters). One would never discover this seaweed, except broken and washed ashore, if timing of observation was not well planned to match the very lowest tides.
World Distribution:
Northern southeast Alaska to Punta María, Baja California, Mexico.
Remarks:
Careful observation is needed to confirm identity/differentiate this species from other similar algae. It has many previous scientific names (earlier taxonomic classifications) which suggest that misidentification or refining identification is notable in Hidden Rib. This difficulty continues today as there is a question as to whether this species should be placed in the genus Botryoglossum or Cryptopleura and if there is a separate species, C. farlowiana, in California.
Classification:
Phylum: Rhodophyta
Class: Florideophyceae
Order: Ceramiales
Family: Delesseriaceae
Genus: Cryptopleura
Species: Cryptopluera ruprechtiana (J.Argardh) Kylin 1924
Former name(s):
Basionym:
Nitophyllum ruprechtianum J.Agardh
Homotypic Synonym(s):
Nitophyllum ruprechtianum J.Agardh 1872
Botryoglossum ruprechtianum (J.Agardh) De Toni 1900
Heterotypic Synonym(s):
Hymenena fimbriata Postels & Ruprecht 1840
Nitphyllum farlowianum J.Agardh 1898
Botryoglossum farlowianum (J.Agardh) De Toni 1900
Botryoglossum farlowianum var. anomalum Hollenberg & Abbott 1965
Cryptopleura farlowiana (J.Agardh) ver Steeg & Josslyn 1997
Figure 7: Cryptopleura ruprechtiana, Ruffled Red Seaweed, floating alongside the large smooth blades of Mazaella splendens (Splendid Iridescent Seaweed). Fishboat Bay, Juan de Fuca Strait, B.C., Canada. July 6, 2020. Photo ID 27457 ©Seaweedwhisperings.com
