MBFE - Day 7 - Sun and Sand

Man oh man, Monday April 27th was a beautiful day on the southern Oregon coast.  You rarely see nicer!  The skies were clear and blue, highs were in the upper 70s, and there was only a gentle breeze.

Earlier in the morning I was debating whether the class should do dock, pier and piling communities or sandy beaches, but when I walked back to my place after breakfast the weather clinched it.  It HAD to be sandy beaches.  Sun and sand just go together.

The plan for the day was to visit several nearby beaches, find and identify as many sand beach community species as we could and collect samples of sand from beaches that ranged from highly protected from wave action to beaches that are fully exposed to pounding waves.  The crew will then later use a set of progressively smaller sieves to sort the sand into size classes and characterize each beach based on sand particle size.

The first stop of the afternoon was Bastendorf Beach, just south of Charleston, OR.

Here is most of the crew (L-R: Rachel S, Jessica, Danielle - behind Jessica, Kelly, Rachel M., Shannon, Jennifer, Courtney, Arianne, Joseph, Devon, and Luke) at our first stop of the day - Bastendorf Beach.  It's a wide beach with moderate wave exposure.  We did some digging, some looking, and found pretty much...a worm.

Our next stop was just around the next point, Lighthouse Beach, Point Gregory:

We found some awesome things there.  

A few students found a couple of dungeness crabs - here's Isaac showing off the find, and yes he knows hes' holding it upside down, but he didn't want to let go of the pincers.  He's so wise.

You can tell that this experience is already seriously affecting the class...I take them to a beautiful beach and they head immediately for the rocky point to see what's on the rocks (L-R: Shannon, Luke, Joseph, Devon, Jennifer).  While there we saw something that's incredibly bizarre, squid egg masses all over the rocks and filling the tide pools.

This is just a couple of small clumps compared to all the egg masses we saw.  We brought some back to the lab for observation. 

Our next stop was Sunset Bay.  This is a beautiful bay that is almost completely surrounded by cliffs and is highly protected from wave action.  It fills during high tides and nearly empties during low tides.

Devon and Luke made an usual sighting there.  They spotted something swimming out of the mouth of a small stream that empties into this bay...it as a 12-16" lamprey.  Devon nearly caught it, but it was just too slippery!  It's the first live lamprey any of us had ever seen.  It was awesome!  Well, as awesome as lamprey can be.  Here's what they look like:

Our next beach stop was Simpson Beach.  

Like Sunset Bay, Simpson Bay has a narrow opening to the sea, but unlike Sunset Bay, Simpson Beach takes a serious pounding when the tide and waves are high.  This is evidenced by the beach safety sign you see as you reach the beach.  Don't worry, we were safe.

The find of the day at Simpson Beach was a cave that went back maybe 30-40 feet.  Here are Luke, Isaac (background) and Devon in the cave.

Our last stop was Cape Arago, where sand samples were collected from South Cove and Middle Cove.  The South Cove collection came off without a hitch...we've already been there a few times as a class.  The Middle Cove sample, however, included a notable misadventure.  

This is Middle Cove, Cape Arago:

I readily admit that I've never been down to Middle Cove, but colleagues told me that there is a steep, but accessible though rough trail...so I found what looked like could be a trail and Joseph, Luke, and Devon were willing to give it a try.  They started down and I then went over to organize a team to collect sand from South Cove. When I got back to the top of Middle Cove to see how that group was doing, they were still very close to the starting point.  Luke had however slipped/slid down a steep slope.  The other two were still close to the starting point.  I told them to hang on and I did a little more exploring and found the real trail head.  Joseph and Devon were able to make it back up, but not Luke...poor guy!  

This photo shows Joseph working his way down toward Devon.  If you look carefully you can see Luke in white over by the large fallen tree.  He had to bushwhack his way over to the other guys and the actual trail.  

Fortunately everything worked out in the end, and here they are collecting the sand sample they were sent to retrieve.  

OK, field trip tally:  6 beaches, sand, sun, a few sunburns, crabs, squid eggs, a lamprey, a cave, and one significant misadventure that turned out alright in the end...thanks to Luke's good nature.

Stay tuned to see what happens next!