All Rights Reserved. really nice to see you have time to update us all on seasonal edibles, and have gone to a lot of trouble to produces a colourful and very tasty looking website. Not really one for cooking, but pickles well. Sea lettuceImage by Kristian Peters, Wikimedia commons. Website by: Your email address will not be published. Hi Mark, Happy Rockpooling! Your page is very informative I only wish I’d found it when I was a lot younger have a great day ,, This delicate green algae prefers brightly lit waters with high nutrient levels. Compared to some other seaweeds on the shore Ulva species are also very fast growing and therefore they are normally one of the first species to settle. I have no idea really why there was so much, but I thinks its a good example of and Ulva bloom. For instance, it may cause difficulty for swimmers to move around the water. Furthermore, the sea lettuce could get attached to fishing nets, hampering fish harvest. This summer for a few weeks Minster beach (above) was completely covered in Ulva intestianlis and I had never seen it like that before despite living there my whole life. If not next time your down the beach I would be very surprised if you didn’t see either one of these species so make sure you check them out! Not much point going into them, as I expect you have a quite different set of botanical to choose from in Oz! They are primary producers, meaning they use photosynthesis to get their energy and are at the bottom of the food chain. Great post, thank you! It has a disc shaped holdfast (equivalent of roots in plants), that it uses to attach onto hard substrate but is very small compared to other seaweed species holdfasts’. Your email address will not be published. A species profile for Water Lettuce. © 2020 Galloway Wild Foods. Cheers, Sea lettuce, (genus Ulva), genus of green algae (family Ulvaceae) usually found growing on rocky shores of seas and oceans around the world. Only one problem, it my be my lack of techy experience, or my pc but I cannot seem to read the descriptions of the wild food your are so expertly giving advice on. On the plus side both the species common names make it super easy to remember! In the scientific classification of plants from kingdom to species, the Sea Lettuce Kingdom is an important factor in the taxonomy of plants. Bleached Ulva intestinalis in Swansea Bay, UK. Learn how your comment data is processed. If viewing issues persist, it would be really useful to know what computer, monitor, browser etc you are using so I can work out where the issue is and explore fixes at my end. In very sheltered conditions, plants that have become detached from the substrate can continue to grow, forming extensive floating communities. Sea lettuce can disrupt human activities in the ocean. Eat as crisps or crumble over soups, stews, salads, fish, sushi etc. It is edible and is often called 'Sea Lettuce'. Compared to most other seaweeds, sea lettuce species can better tolerate being exposed during low tide. Visiting Galloway for Galloway Wild Foods Events, Corona Virus and Galloway Wild Foods Events, Recipe: How to make sushi with wild ingredients. It is the type species of the genus Ulva. It is also common for them to become unattached and they can still survive floating through the water clumping together. Edibility: 5/5 Sea lettuce is pleasant if unspectacular fresh, becoming truly delicious when dried – with a rich deep flavour. It is Used in Aquarium Trade. Hi Ross, Not really one for cooking, but pickles well. Seasonal appearance: All year, with large blooms in the summer. Ulva intestinalis is a longer seaweed with hollow tubes that fill with air to float in the water. Minster Beach, Kent. Notify me of follow-up comments by email. Habitat: High and low intertidal zones; water to 75 feet deep. 13. However the person who discovered Ulva intestinalis probably had a bit of a different personality to the person who named sea lettuce because Ulva intestinalis‘s common name is gutweed. During a 'bloom', large amounts can float freely and blanket a large stretch of the shore. It has a disc shaped holdfast (equivalent of roots in plants), that it uses to attach onto hard substrate but is very small compared to other seaweed species holdfasts’. So it grows near the shore. Hi, I live in Australia and down the south coast from me is a fishmonger who sells pickled sea lettuce do you have a recipe for such a thing if you do would you please share it with me, I thank you in anticipation The sea lettuce is found at all levels of the intertidal, although in more northerly latitudes and in brackish habitats it is found in the shallow sublittoral. Hopefully you will have seen these species before if you have ever been rock pooling and now know a bit more about them! Usually the combination of excess nutrients (usually excess phosphorous triggers growth in macroalgae) and longer time in the sunlight (if its summer), creates the ideal conditions to grow fast, the result of which is referred to as a macroalgal bloom. Do you know why you can’t you eat sea lettuce from September? The bacteria involved in such breakdown reduce the amount of oxygen in the water column. Too much light and heat exposure can actually destroy the photosystems involved in photosynthesis, killing the cells. One factor that helps attachment of these species is that they have small holdfasts and can therefore be found in a variety of locations such as rocky shores, sandy shores and they can be epiphytic on algae (live on other seaweeds, see below), as they need very little space to attach too. Ulva lactuca growing on Corallina officinalis. Ulva lactuca and Ulva intestinalis are probably two of the most common species found on UK shores. The thallus of ulvoid species is flat and blade-like and is composed of two layers of cells.