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Winter Low Tides

admin — Mon, 07 Apr 2025 01:08:36 +0000

What is hidden under the water during the hot summer sun is uncovered in the cooler winter months. The late fall and winter extreme low tides are an opportunity to observe part of our marine habitat without getting in the water. I can’t think of another place where so much wildlife can be easily observed in its natural habitat. All plants and animals in the tidepools throughout Laguna Beach are protected. To protect this fragile habitat it’s important to follow the Tidepool rules: 1. Never remove animals, shells or rocks from the tidepools. 2. Never pick up animals…..observe them where they are. 3. Walk gently, taking care not to step on plants or animals. 4. Never turn over rocks. A great way to visit the tidepools is to go to Treasure Island at the Montage or to Heisler Park near Bird Rock where Laguna Ocean Foundation’s Tidepool Educators can answer your questions and help guide you to the amazing plants and animals there. At the extreme low tides all the intertidal zones and the animals that live there are exposed from sea anemones in the upper zone to sea stars in the lower zones.

This year is turning out to be a good year for sea hares. We’ve been seeing a lot in the tidepools both big and tiny. The hermaphroditic sea hare lays millions of eggs in its short 1-2 year life span. If all these eggs hatched and lived to maturity, the tidepools would be 6 ft deep in sea hares!

Recent sightings have included moray eels and a rarely seen in the tidepools, bright yellow snail. Visit Laguna Bluebelt’s Facebook page to view a short video of the moray eel poking its head out after sunset

We’ve had a lot of octopus sightings- a number of baby octopus and the largest two-spotted octopus that I’ve ever seen in the tidepools.

The large octopus is pretty active. He/she has been named Gollum because if you are not careful he will steal your “Precious” camera. Visit Laguna Bluebelt’s Facebook page to view a short 8 sec. video of Gollum coming out of the water. LIKE our page to stay updated on the Laguna Bluebelt and to enjoy more beautiful photos from above and below the water. If you are inspired to help protect the tidepools you can become a docent through Laguna Ocean Foundation’s periodic docent trainings. The next docent training is January 4, 2012, for more info go to their website: Laguna Ocean Foundation

Leopard Sharks, Bat Rays and Me

admin — Sun, 30 Mar 2025 00:00:00 +0000

If you’re (fool) hardy enough to get in the water to snorkel or scuba in the late fall/early winter, you can be rewarded with amazingly clear water and “Lake Laguna” conditions. Typically the best water visibility of the year occurs at this time. The conditions the last month or so have been phenomenal, with many days having 20-30 ft visibility. If you can handle the 56-59 degree water and have been out there, you know what I mean. If you can’t imagine doing such a crazy thing, I will share my experience from one epic day of snorkeling earlier this month. I swam from Main Beach to Monument Point through the existing Heisler Park State Marine Reserve and the visibility was a phenomenal 30 Feet+. I must have seen ~50 leopard sharks and 100-200 bat rays in the kelp bed. I swear I’m not exaggerating. I still can’t quite believe what I saw. I felt like I was floating over an Underwater Serengeti.

The leopard sharks were everywhere and the bat rays were in the kelp bed off Bird Rock/Rockpile Beach. But the best leopard shark jamboree was just south of Monument Point. I lost track after 12- there were easily 2 dozen, 3-6 footers just doing their shark swimming around thing. It was probably only 15 ft deep there so I had a great view and so clear they were casting shadows on the sandy bottom. Neither leopard sharks or bat rays are dangerous- they usually stay near the bottom where their prey lives. Their diets includes mollusks, crustaceans and fish. I also saw a horn shark resting on the bottom and found a few abalone and the kelp itself was just beautiful.

Check out these short videos of the leopard sharks, a bat ray, and diving down to check out a horn shark and an abalone: Swimming with Sharks in the Laguna Bluebelt Bat Ray gliding through the Kelp Forest Horn Shark resting on the bottom Abalone 25 years of snorkeling here and its one of my most memorable days. To see more photos from that day, visit Laguna Bluebelt’s Facebook page LIKE our page to stay updated on the Laguna Bluebelt and to enjoy more beautiful photos from above and below the water. The existing Heisler Park Marine Reserve is one of my favorite places to snorkel. The difference between the habitat in this no-take reserve versus some of the other nearby coves is dramatic. The rocks are covered with kelp and coralline algae. There are urchins but you have to look for them. The fish are more abundant and larger. I routinely see fish species within the reserve that I rarely see outside the reserve. So even on this minuscule scale, Marine Reserves work- I have seen it with my own eyes right here in Laguna Beach. We know from the science that this very small reserve is far from the size needed to effectively allow fish to reproduce and replenish to the levels needed to allow spillover to surrounding areas for consumptive users. One can only imagine this healthy marine habitat multiplied along the entire Laguna coastline as the expanded Laguna Beach State Marine Reserve takes effect on Jan. 1st, 2012. With the combined effects of stopping extraction, abalone and kelp restoration, urchin mitigation and improved water quality it will be exciting to witness the restoration first hand over the coming years. There are many examples of successful marine reserves: Channel Islands MPAs: Report on the First 5 Years of Monitoring: 2003-2008 and the recently released study from scientists at the Scripps Institute of Oceanography on the Cabo Pulmo National Marine Park in Baja: New study shows that Cabo Pulmo is the “most robust marine preserve in the world” Scientists will be monitoring the new MPAs and we’ll be looking forward to their findings in the coming years. In the meantime I will be swimming out in the Laguna Bluebelt doing my own “observational research” and letting you know what I see. I plan to start on Jan. 1st at noon by swimming out to the kelp bed from Main Beach and perhaps up to Monument Point to see if I can recreate this experience or have a new one. Anyone care to join me? If you don’t want to get in the water, bring your paddle board or kayak . We’ll meet at noon at the Lifeguard tower. Let’s celebrate the new year and the start of the restoration of the marine habitat in the Laguna Bluebelt.

Tidepool Tales and Kelp

admin — Tue, 04 Jun 2024 02:07:57 +0000

You don’t have to get into the water to notice the tremendous increase in the kelp forest off Laguna over the last year. A number of groups including thousands of individuals have been involved in the restoration of the giant kelp over the past few years. These efforts combined with good environmental conditions have contributed to the current healthy kelp habitat. A healthy kelp forest is vital to our marine habitat- over 800 different species rely on them.

If you do get in the water and go snorkeling or diving, you’ll notice that it’s not just the giant kelp (Macrocystis pyrifera), but many other kelp species are thriving. There’s so much kelp in some places I have a hard time finding some of my favorite spots when I’m out snorkeling. I no longer can find a hole where I would usually spot an octopus- there’s just too much kelp around there to find the rock features that surrounded the octopus den.

There’s a natural bowl with a crack at the bottom where I can usually find moray eels (I once saw 3 in there!) but it’s hard to find because of all the kelp growing in that area. Also swimming now has the added challenge of zig-zagging around the kelp. These are small prices to pay for the enormous benefits that the kelp brings to our marine habitat. I certainly don’t want to go back to the days of clear, unobstructed views of the urchin barrens.

The increase in the kelp should lead to an increase in all the species that rely on kelp for a food source and shelter. When I swim out to the kelp forest I know I see a lot of fish hanging around- opal eye, kelp bass, senoritas, sargo, sardines and many others. Just the other day while out swimming near the kelp bed, I was surrounded by 100-200 yellowtail or white sea bass (sorry, I’m not that good at identifying fish). The visibility was maybe 10-15 ft so I couldn’t see that far, but I was in the middle of a big school of fish, some over 2 ft long.

The seals, sea lions, and dolphins seem to like the kelp forest as well- or more likely they’re attracted to all the fish hanging out in the kelp. I’ve had a few encounters with playful, curious harbor seals while swimming near the kelp. This one played with us for half an hour until we got cold and had to leave. If you go out kayaking or paddle boarding to the kelp forest you’re likely to have an encounter with one of our local marine mammals.

There’s a danger to the kelp forest lurking out there. Sea urchins are voracious consumers of kelp and unfortunately, the sea urchin population is out of control. I know in the last 6 months I have watched an explosion of urchins grow from small to medium on the rocky points surrounding Shaw’s Cove and they are devouring everything around them. We have removed their main predators- first the otter was driven to extinction in this area a century ago and now we take too many lobster and sheephead fish.

There is hope for the balance to be restored. The new Laguna Beach State marine reserve will protect most of Laguna’s coast. Marine reserves are no-take zones. This will allow the lobster and sheephead to increase in both numbers and size and hopefully keep the urchin population in check. I know I’m looking forward to observing (through a dive mask) the restoration of Laguna’s marine habitat continue and hopefully accelerate with the implementation of the new marine reserve. What changes have you noticed as the kelp forest has recovered? Please share your observations in the comments. Info on Giant Kelp from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Fishes of the Kelp Forest from the Birch Aquarium

Tips on Free Diving in Kelp

In watching seals and otters swim through the kelp effortlessly and without incident, we can learn a valuable lesson about being as streamlined as possible while diving. The problem for divers usually comes when they snag items that are not streamlined with the rest of their bodies. The most notorious culprits are dive knives, fin buckles, and snorkels. Read more.

One World One Ocean

admin — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 20:13:06 +0000

MacGillivray Freeman Films Educational Foundation launched their ‘One World One Ocean’ awareness campaign. You are invited to join the movement to restore and protect the health of the world’s oceans.

The ocean gives us life. 50-70% of our oxygen comes from the ocean. That’s more oxygen than all the rainforests combined.

The ocean is the #1 source of protein for the world’s population. But we’re not taking care of our oceans. 90% of the large fish are already gone.

We can reverse this trend by joining together and working to increase marine reserves worldwide.

Learn More About One World One Ocean and Why We Need to Act

If You Don’t Know, You Can’t Care

Tidepool Tales

admin — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 22:59:57 +0000

Octupus

Trivia Snail

Welcome to Tidepool Tales!
We want this to be a fun and informative blog, sharing photos and observations from the Laguna Bluebelt.

Seeing the ocean’s nurseries growing and prospering is the key to restoring our coastal habitats. Knowing that marine reserves serve to shelter and nourish sea life makes looking into our tidepools even more rewarding.

Join me as we explore Laguna’s intertidal zone and it’s remarkable sea life.
We might be exploring the Tidepools, paddling in a kayak, or out in the water snorkeling or scuba diving. Although we try to be accurate with our information, we are not marine biologists. We invite you to share your knowledge in the comments.

Laguna’s intertidal zone is a dynamic environment that has many challenges to it’s inhabitants. There are natural challenges including surf, sun, sand, predators, and even flooding. Man-made challenges include water pollution, trash, trampling, collecting, ocean warming and acidification.

The photo on the right was taken the afternoon after the historic flood in Laguna last December. The flood brought a great influx of freshwater down Laguna Canyon and into the tidepools near Main Beach/ Bird Rock. The flood also covered a large area of the tidepools with sand- the sand seen in this photo is normally not there. The beaches were covered with garbage and vegetation swept down the canyon. In addition, marine plants and animals including crabs and many mollusk species were washed up on the beach most dead but some still alive.

The photo below was taken about two weeks after the flood, by then the sand in the lower tidal zone was gone, but the upper zone was still covered. Finally over a month later, wave action eventually cleared out the sand.

Some species seemed to have survived this event better than others. For example, sea anemones buried in sand for over one month, have survived in great numbers although in some cases their tentacles, usually a shade of green, turned white. While other species such as octopus and giant key-hole limpets have not been seen since the flood. Some mollusk species are ‘shocked’ by an influx of fresh water and will release from the rocks and then wash up on shore.

Despite these myriad challenges, life in the intertidal zone is very resilient and it is one of the easiest places to experience an abundance of diverse wildlife. This resilience can be witnessed as we observe the recovery of the tidepools from the flood. An example of this recovery was observed last weekend, when we found an animal we hadn’t seen since before the flood- the beautiful Hopkin’s Rose nudibranch.

Hopkin's Rose

Tidepools are our Mirrors into the Ocean.