“Takin’ on the jellies, you got serious thrill issues dude”  Parents might recognize this line from Disney’s animated
film, Finding Nemo.

This is on the Pender Islands, Beaumont Marine Park, at a small campground with six spaces. We are there on
our annual ritual camping trip with friends from Victoria and Vancouver. It’s Canada day long weekend, the official
beginning of summer for us all. We came by canoe – no easy task for 10 adults and 8 children, including my daughter
Charlotte in her wheelchair. Not to mention food, clothes and camping gear
for all. The children are all between the ages of four and seven.

Here we have Blythe on the left and Sarah, my youngest daughter, on the right, then both age four. They’re takin’
on the jellies ... collecting them in a bucket. At this age, the world is new, and the creatures in it are fascinating.
It turns out to be with good reason. Jellyfish really are really fascinating creatures.

As our environment changes with global warming, je lyfish appear to be taking it all in stride, and their population
is exploding. In Japan, the giant Nomura’s jellyfish is causing great distress for the fishing fleet. These gobs of
floating jelly can weigh 450 pounds and make a mess of fishing nets. They sting, to boot. For years, Japanese
fishermen have been attempting to cull them by chopping them up and dumping them back into the ocean.
But scientists have now discovered that this particular species has a unique survival response. When the adults
are threatened, they instinctually release all of their eggs ... Oops.

There are few really ancient species that have evolved so little in  basic design over the ages. One is the jellyfish; 
t is a close-to-perfect organism for its environment. We might want to think twice before ... takin’ on the jellies.   Mark Heine