Tidepooling

Last year we tried tidepooling for the first time, and we were hooked.  The lowest tides of the year tend to occur every spring, so the trick is to find a good minus tide (generally the best are more than two feet below sea level) that happens in daylight hours.   It is best to search online for a tide table that will cover the area near where you want to be.   My strategy is to plan on leaving the beach shortly after the low tide point, because after that the tide will start coming in.  Some beaches are much more level than others, and this can happen especially quickly.   Our minus tide took place at 8AM, so we headed to the beach shortly after the sun rose.  This year I found this really thorough list of good places to tidepool on the Oregon coast.  I picked the Bob Creek Wayside to explore.  This was a good place for several reasons.  The tidepools were exquisite, and many were located on big lumpy basalt projections entirely surrounded by sand.  That made it easy to explore the tidepools without ever once having to worry about stepping on the small shelly creatures or tiny sea anemones that completely encrust the surface of the rocks.  There were some really nice sea caves that were fun to explore.  And it was completely deserted when we arrived.  For most of the time we were there, we were the only people. Bob Creek itself flows into the sea here, and proved difficult to cross, but the best tidepools and the sea caves were located on the near side of the creek.  I have a lot of pictures indeed to share.

A chiton, an algae eating mollusk.

Jasper found this creature, which rolled itself into a ball.

When placed back in the water, it unrolled itself and wiggled around (upper left).  What is it?!  We don't know for sure.  We've got lots of library books on order, in the hope of finding out!

The largest of the sea caves.

These pillbug-like critters were nearly an inch long and living in mysterious round holes in the sea cave.

The smaller sea cave, with a floor covered in a thick layer of  obsidian, rounded by many centuries of ocean waves.

Jasper found a mysterious shrimp.

He let it go, and instantly it had completely buried itself in the sand.

The tide begins to come in.