Tour at Low Tide Reveals Wonders Walking and Wowing

By John Gillie, The News Tribune, Tacoma, Wash.

Jul. 1–The beach at Kopachuck State Park was littered with dozens of forms the size and shape of the business end of a bathroom plunger Saturday morning.

Had a plumbing truck careened into Puget Sound, or was there a more natural explanation for this curious happening?

Ask any of the 60 people — parents, children, oldsters and youngsters — who joined the third annual guided beach walk sponsored by Pierce County Conservation District and Shellfish Partners and they likely have a ready answer.

“That’s the thing that the moon snail makes to contain its eggs,” said 9-year-old Caittlin Tyler of Gig Harbor. “It’s made of sand.”

That bit of beach biology was among dozens of facts shared by veteran Department of Fish and Wildlife marine educator Alan Rammer in a two-hour tour of the lively tidal ecosystem at Kopachuck, near Gig Harbor.

Rammer’s tour through the beach’s several “neighborhoods” was the highlight of the event. The tour took place during one of summer’s low tides when much of the beach life ordinarily beneath the water’s surface was exposed to view.

What appeared to be just an expansive slab of gray sand from a distance was in fact a habitat teeming with life, from crabs to worms, at a closer view.

Ethan Santos, 11, of Olalla, found much to examine. Santos came to the beach walk with his mom, his siblings, two friends and his grandmother.

“I’ve found sand dollars, baby barnacles, flounders and a school of fish,” he said.

When properly protected from pollution, theft and careless people, a beach like Kopachuck’s is home to abundant life, Rammer said. Some of the world’s largest creatures of their kind — the Puget Sound octopus, the geoduck clam and giant barnacles — inhabit local waters.

Education is helping people better understand the nature and role of the inland waters’ vast array of creatures, Rammer said.

Common nomenclature, for instance, has changed to better describe some creatures found in Puget Sound. Starfish, for instance, are now more properly called sea stars, and jellyfish are now correctly called sea jellies. That’s because although they live in the water, neither is a fish.

Rammer corrected other myths:

–Most clams can be aged by counting the rings in their shells. Not so, Rammer said. Only the giant geoduck clam’s age can be determined by rings in its shell.

–Crabs with new clean shells are the best buys from fish merchants. Again, not true, he said. Crabs with unmarked clean shells have recently molted and have yet to fully grow into their shells. Instead, pick a crab with a shell encrusted with barnacles and grime.

Rammer suggested that clam diggers learn to distinguish among the four kinds of “steamer clams” available on Puget Sound beaches. Butter clams are most likely to contain and retain the red tide toxins that cause paralytic shellfish poisoning.

Within a few minutes of the walk’s beginning, Madison Broadwell, 7, had already become something of an expert on the hundreds of small shore crabs skittering through the sand dollar colonies near shore.

She could distinguish females from males.

“The females have a big round belly,” she said. “The males have a triangular mark like a tie on their bellies.”

John Gillie: 253-597-8663

john.gillie@thenewstribune.com

Seven beach Rules

State Department of Fish and Wildlife marine educator Alan Rammer offers these conservation guidelines to those who want to see beach life up close: 2. Don’t rearrange the furniture. If you turn over a rock or a log, put it back the way you found it. Creatures that live under logs don’t like sunshine. Creatures that live on the top don’t like the muck.

3. Don’t take anything home. The empty shells and pieces of wood provide shelter for animals.

4. Don’t leave garbage, especially small bright-colored items that birds may ingest. A dead seabird found recently in Long Beach had 59 pieces of plastic in its gut.

5. Don’t run in flip-flops or sandals on the beach. You can trip and cut yourself on sharp objects.

6. Wet your hands before picking up marine animals. Dry hands can damage them.

7. Return sea creatures to the place where you found them. Putting them down in a different “neighborhood” could endanger their lives. Help our Habitat

Saturday’s beach walk at Kopachuck State Park is one of many environmental stewardship events that can be found on our new Web page, Help Our Habitat.

More than a dozen organizations have posted events aimed at protecting or restoring parks, creeks and other elements of our natural environment.

Find a link to it from our home page at www.thenewstribune.com.

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Copyright (c) 2007, The News Tribune, Tacoma, Wash.

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