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In the Zone

Kevin Archibald and Chrissy Hernandez, students in the MIT-WHOI Joint Program, visit a Cape Cod beach to study the intertidal zone, the area exposed between high and low tides. They examined this boulder to see zonation—the way that different species of animals and plants occupy different heights above the water. Can you see it? Looking closely, you might see two or more barnacle species distributed vertically on the rock. This field trip with WHOI biologists Ann Tarrant and Lauren Mullineaux was part of a Biological Oceanography class. (Photo by Ann Tarrant, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)