West Seattle, Washington
19 Thursday
Earlier this week, we published the saga of the large Lincoln Park driftwood stump taken to Alki Beach by a Seattle Parks crew. Tonight – more Lincoln Park driftwood on the move, but this time it’s via the “king tides.” The photos show one of the logs carved by artists on the LP beach last year. Karann MacNealy spotted it on the beach just north of Cormorant Cove, in the 3600 block off Beach Drive, today, and shared the photos.
After last month’s “king tides,” it turned up in front of an apartment building just north of there – Keith sent a photo on December 22nd, but we didn’t get around to publishing it. When the tide started rising again this week, we asked him if it was still there – he checked, and it was gone; then Karann reported spotting it today. (So did David, who posted photos on the WSB Facebook page.) But the next few days are bringing another round of “king tides” – 13 feet, before dawn – so no guarantee it’ll still be there tomorrow!
(Photos by Nick Adams for WSB)
As the first day of 2013 comes to an end, a closer look at some of the people who started it with a brisk tradition – West Seattle’s annual Polar Bear Swim on Alki. Though hundreds dashed into Puget Sound together, for each one, it was a very personal type of triumph. Above, Andrew Kurtz‘s fist-pump; next, Lisa Hayden‘s spirited wave as she emerged:
Charlie Duncan and Steve Douglas were pumped up even before they went in:
More of WSB contributing photojournalist Nick Adams‘ Polar Bear Swim scenes – before, during, and after – ahead:
If you haven’t made it out to see the mega-low late-night tides this week – you have a few more chances. Last night was the lowest low tide this time around, -3.6 feet at 10:41 pm, and we’ve received a few photos – above and below, from Lisa Stencel:
And this one from Kalani:
Tonight’s low tide is -3.4 at about 11:30 pm, and both mornings this weekend have the highest high tides of the cycle too – 13 feet at 6:50 am Saturday and 7:34 am Sunday. (Here’s the chart.) And if you’d like to explore the nighttime tidepools with an expert – Lance reminded us overnight that Seattle Parks has a naturalist-led event 10 pm-midnight across from Me Kwa Mooks:
Exploring the fascinating world of intertidal life by flashlight! Please wear very warm clothing and waterproof footwear (rain slickers too). Please bring a flashlight if you have one or borrow one from us. All ages welcome as long as you can walk on slippery seaweed and stay up late into the night. All children must be accompanied by an adult. Please pre-register https://class.seattle.gov/parks/Activities/ActivitiesAdvSearch.asp and then on the night of the 15th, meet at Me Kwa Mooks beach, across from Me-Kwa-Mooks Park (4503 Beach Dr. SW)
(12/3/12 photo from Richey Viewpoint, by Don Brubeck, shared via WSB Flickr group)
Heads up for beach-walking fans – the next week-plus will bring extremely high tides and very low tides. Given the season, the most dramatic extremes will be in the late-night and early-morning hours – though the afternoon high tides are notable too. As detailed on our favorite tide chart, each of the next four afternoons will bring a high tide of at least 12 feet (1:09 pm today); the nighttime low tide is -1.6 at 8:23 pm tonight and bottoms out at -3.6 feet at 10:41 pm Thursday. The morning high tides will surpass the afternoon levels starting on Thursday, reaching 13 feet at 6:50 am Saturday and 7:34 am Sunday. These are the “king tides,” and the state is again asking for help with photo documentation – explained on this page, along with a link for adding to their Flickr gallery (and please consider adding West Seattle photos to the WSB Flickr group too – thank you).
(Photo by Robin Lindsey)
One more wildlife photo this Thanksgiving night … a seal we got to see for ourselves the other day, driving on our way to something and pulling over upon noticing the unmistakable sign of a Seal Sitters stakeout, a cordoned-off area and a vigilant volunteer. They were out this week even in the worst of the rainy/windy weather on Monday. This time around, they’ve been kept busy by an adult seal nicknamed “Captain.” Seal Sitters’ Robin Lindsey writes about her on the “blubberblog.” (Robin also has a Thanksgiving message from Seal Sitters that you might want to read.)
(Added: August photo of the geese, courtesy of Myrtle)
10:22 AM: We’ve received two reports of this so far. First one was from Sig:
A man on a bike with his dog running loose at the south end of Lincoln Park at about 8:15 this morning allowed his dog to attack one of the beautiful white geese. The dog injured the goose on the land and took it out in the water all the way to the moored boats. No sign of the goose so hopefully he will show up. His partner is honking on the beach and very frightened. The man got on his bike as soon as he could get the dog to come back (still no leash in sight) and took off in a dark Subaru Outback with a bike rack on the back and top. Hopefully someone can watch for the injured goose and help him.
Second one came from a reader who didn’t want to be identified:
I just got back from a walk at Lincoln Park where some bozo’s dog – off leash – attacked the resident geese on the beach.
I arrived just after the event so my story comes second-hand from a Parks employee who witnessed this and told me what had happened.
Apparently the dog attacked the geese, leaving feathers all over the path, and then chased one of the birds through the water all the way to the ferry dock.
As I arrived the dog’s owner, who had walked south down the private part of the beach, about halfway to the ferry, coaxed the dog back to shore then high-tailed it out of the park on his mountain bike. (He was wearing a yellow and black biking shirt)
There were about 20 of us watching and looking for the goose. I continued my walk then returned to that area about 20 minutes later- but no goose..
I am sharing this because dogs are not allowed on public beaches (period) and there is no off-leash area in Lincoln Park yet I see dogs running free there almost every day. Each time I do I grumble to myself about it rather than confronting the owners. I know people love their dogs.
If you’re not familiar with the Lincoln Park/Fauntleroy area white geese – here’s a photo of one – they (or, perhaps, their relatives) have been on the beach there for years (we remember seeing them more than a decade ago). Their room to roam is curtailed right now, possibly forcing them further south, because of the Barton Pump Station Upgrade Project work that has taken over the pocket beach at Cove Park immediately north of the Fauntleroy ferry dock. We’ll be following up to see if we can find out what has happened since the search mentioned above; please let us know if you hear/see anything.
3:01 PM UPDATE: If you haven’t seen this in the comment thread yet: We checked with Parks, and they told us Animal Control was planning to visit the park to investigate – they had indeed received a call about this to dispatch earlier today. A commenter subsequently reported that both geese were found and seem to be OK, which was confirmed by a beach resident who has seen them.
ADDED: From Dewey Potter @ Parks: “One employee observed most of the incident, confronted the individual about his dog being off leash, and notified Seattle Animal Shelter. The Sr. Gardener who called me back said the description in the WS Blog of the dog owner is accurate. If anyone can provide a name, a license number, or other identifying information, SAS staff will talk with the dog owner and tell him what the penalties are for having a dog on the beach and for harassing wildlife.”
(First 2 photos by Hannah Letinich)
Been to Alki today? Notice something missing? Thanks to volunteers including the ones above, here’s what you’re NOT seeing on and in the Alki Beach sand:
Today’s big work party for International Coastal Cleanup Day, led by partners including Puget Soundkeeper Alliance, is a wrap – but help ’em out and be sure to toss your non-recyclables and pack out your recyclables next time you’re there!
ADDED SUNDAY NIGHT: Thanks to Tom Foley for additional information and photos. He says about 80 people joined in:
And the cigarette butts alone totaled more than 30 pounds, Tom adds. Two unusual items recovered: a rusty hatchet and pocket knife:
Tom volunteers with Puget Soundkeeper Alliance.
If you haven’t heard yet about the big Alki Beach cleanup that is part of International Coastal Cleanup Day this Saturday … go sign up! Sponsors including Puget Soundkeeper Alliance would like to know how many people to plan for. You can sign up outside Duke’s on Alki starting at 10 am Saturday – the cleanup runs till noon, followed by an afterparty till 2 – but they say early online signups are even better. Read all about it here.
Northwest Hope and Healing‘s annual benefit walk/run, the Alki Beach 5K, is happening this morning – so Alki Avenue SW will be closed from 63rd SW east/southeastward, approximately 8 am-11 am. You can still join in the 5K, too, even if you’re not signed up yet; on-site registration starts at 8 am, by the Alki Bathhouse.
Some have asked if the Paddle to Squaxin tribal canoes are still on Alki, where they landed Monday afternoon as a stop along the journey to the big annual gathering, to be held in the Olympia area this year. We went back over to Alki to be sure we had the correct answer: Yes. Departures aren’t planned until tomorrow morning, when they will head to the next stop, hosted by the Puyallup Tribe; the Muckleshoots are the hosts here – all the stops are on this map. (Our coverage from Monday is here and here.)
ADDED: Stately sunset view with a canoe’s bow in silhouette, from David Hutchinson:
Despite everything else happening on Saturday, more than 50 took time out to help clean up West Seattle’s busiest beach. From Seal Sitters‘ Robin Lindsey:
Seal Sitters teamed up with Alki Community Council and Seattle Parks to sponsor a cleanup of Alki Beach (and Constellation Park) in honor of seal pup Sandy who was found dead, entangled in derelict fishing line earlier this year. Fifty-one passionate people showed up, anxious to do their part to help protect sea life from the dangers of marine debris and trash. Peggy Foreman of NOAA talked briefly about marine debris and specifically about the stranded Arroyos gray whale whose stomach contents consisted solely of human trash.
While the beach did not appear to be as littered as usual on a summer Saturday morning due to a rather rainy Friday, the volunteers (20 Seal Sitters and 31 folks from the community, 6 of those minors) filled about 10 large trash bags. Armed with buckets, bags and grabbers, they picked up plastic bottles and caps, countless cigarette butts, and among other things a kayak paddle, a woman’s black and pink bra and dirty diapers. We even had a family drive all the way from Ellensburg just to pick up trash on the beach. Brooklyn, the “almost” 9 year old daughter, read about seals on our website, saw the post about Sandy and told her mom and dad that she wanted to come help seal pups by cleaning up the beach. We can’t thank everyone enough for helping out today. A minimum of 120 hours were donated this morning (we have not yet tallied the worksheets for an actual figure). All of these volunteers are a true inspiration!
Robin says the photo she shared shows “students from UW’s Environmental Studies program (Kim, Alex, Nick and Ana) who each donated over 3 hours of their time” on Saturday.
In this morning’s “West Seattle Saturday” preview, we mentioned the scheduled Alki launch of “sky lanterns” as a fundraiser for youth arts education. Seems the wind on Alki was not conducive to a mass lantern launch, and organizers announced via Twitter they were moving to the south end of Lincoln Park and planning to send up the lanterns around 10. So we’re mentioning it in case anyone in that area is taken by surprise.
We’ve shared photos taken by others, but never before have we had the chance to personally photograph one of Alki’s famous road-crossing river otters. S/he just turned up while we were standing on the Duwamish Head seawall to get a photo of this great blue heron …
Then a gentleman unloading a Wiseman’s Appliance truck shouted something like “THERE’s your photo op!” – we turned, and the otter was suddenly on the sidewalk, galumphing over to slide down the seawall:
… and onto the beach. It was just about noon, so, we assume, lunch break time. PLEASE be careful when you drive Alki Avenue … the otters seem to be frequent commuters.
WSB’s newest professional photojournalist contributor, Nick Adams, netted that image of people fishing during Monday’s sunset at Lincoln Park. Today’s forecast is a little murky – then again, so was Monday’s, and the sun triumphed anyway.
More driftwood carving at Lincoln Park, two and a half weeks after a whale and moon snail appeared. Bob Bussman shared photos of the work he spotted during a walk along Lincoln Park’s north beach yesterday afternoon – he described what they’re working on as a seal:
We don’t know if that person and another one Bob saw are the same ones who created the whale and moon snail (do you?), but the carving is being done in the same area.
The low-low (below -3 feet) tides are gone till an encore early next month, but we have a few more community-contributed photos to remember them by. Above, Tracey Spenser‘s view of an anemone amid glistening greenery; next, Lura Ercolano shows us a moon snail has quite the infrastructure beneath the graceful shell:
Also out on the beach, “Diver Laura” James – but look very carefully behind her, around the center of the photo:
The great blue heron was apparently too intent on fishing to mind the people nearby:
Thursday’s low tide will still make for decent beachwalking – -2.6 at xx – but if you are hoping to get out while the beach is at its widest, mark your calendar for late mornings Monday 7/2 through Wednesday 7/4 (here’s the July chart). Thanks yet again to everyone who shared their photos during this “wave” of low-low tides!
Today’s low-low tide brought some great noontime sights – we’ve received some excellent photos and took a few ourselves (plus we have a few awesome WSB’er-contributed holdovers from yesterday). We’ll be adding to these a little later in the evening but are starting with three from Gary Jones – wildlife catching, or seeking, lunch!
Today’s tide was the lowest, but tomorrow will still be fairly low, at -3.4 just before 1 pm.
More photos to come – and thanks again to everyone who has shared. ADDED 7:42 PM: The next two photos are by WSB’s Patrick Sand – we were out on the beach by Luna/Anchor Park:
The pilings beneath the park overlook – where the former Luna Park amusement park’s swimming pool used to be:
Laurie shared a photo of the Seattle Aquarium volunteer beach naturalists mustering by Constellation Park:
(They’ll be out at Constellation and Lincoln Parks again tomorrow, 11 am-2:30 pm.) And from Jim Clark, taken on Monday – a mystery creature (do YOU know what it is?):
As noted in comments, Jim has a gallery here. And more of others’ low-tide photos are in the WSB Flickr group pool (tidepool?) – see them here. (
Luckie shares that photo from the beach at Constellation Park south of Alki Point, the most popular tidewalking spot during this morning’s low-low tide – we drove by around noon and noted school buses from Mercer Island, Issaquah, and Seattle districts. (Further south, we noted a Highline bus across from Me-Kwa-Mooks.) On West Seattle’s north-facing shore, we stopped for a look at the stubs of pilings where the Luna Park amusement park stood a century ago:
Here’s a Luna Park photo from the Seattle Municipal Archives:
Tomorrow’s low-low tide is the lowest of the month, -3.8 just after noon.
Seen along local shores:
Scott Bessho shared photos of carvings on a driftwood log along Lincoln Park’s north beach. He said he spotted people working on it with professional-looking carving tools on Friday; when he went by again late Saturday, they were gone, but the carvings were clearly visible, what appears to be a whale, and a whorl – here’s a closer-up look at the latter:
We haven’t seen them in person ourselves, but since it would be quite the operation to move a log like that, we’re guessing they’re still there.
If you were out on any local beach at midday today, during the first of four mega-low tides continuing through Wednesday, wildlife was the big attraction:
From Lowman Beach, John Legge shared that photo of what he identifies as opalescent nudibranches – and a spotted one, too:
Then from Alki, Katy tweeted this photo, wondering what it was, since she had seen so many today:
We’re 99 percent sure it was made by a moon snail – let us know if we’re wrong! Meantime, tomorrow’s low tide is even lower, -3.7 at 11:19 am.
LOW-LOW TIDES: Thanks to Lura for the tip: Another round of extra-low low tides has arrived. Each of the next four days will bring a low tide of more than -3 feet, which means many tidepools and other things to explore (carefully!). Here’s our favorite tide calendar with the specific times – or, you can use the WSB Events Calendar, where each of those days has an entry not only featuring the low-tide times, but also the hours that you’ll find Seattle Aquarium volunteer beach naturalists at 2 sites in West Seattle. Happy exploring!
IN THE SKY: Also in the next few days, you have the chance to see two phenomena, both, of course weather permitting. Early Monday, there’s a partial eclipse of the moon – and we do mean EARLY, as in 4 am our time. NASA explains it here. Then on Tuesday, it’s the Transit of Venus – with NASA Solar System Ambassador Alice Enevoldsen as your guide at West Seattle’s Solstice Park. This is NOT something you can just go outside and check out. See Alice’s website for lots of information, including an event on Tuesday.
When we caught up with Mountain to Sound Outfitters and Alki Kayak Tours proprietor Greg Whittaker at his new on-the-beach rental stand around 4 pm, he said it had been a busy day – so busy, all the stand-up paddleboards were out between his two waterfront locations, except the one with which he posed! Perfect day for a debut, given that both the weather and the crowd gave Alki a bit of a Venice Beach veneer. The M2S setup also includes other beachgoing supplies – sunscreen, water bottles, hats:
Other sports equipment will be phased in at the rental stand, on the sand at 55th SW.
(Photos courtesy Puget Soundkeeper Alliance)
Thanks to work this week by Puget Soundkeeper Alliance, in cooperation with the state Natural Resources department and Seattle Parks, there’s less toxic creosote on Lincoln Park’s beach right now – and that means less in the marine ecosystem. Earlier this week, crews were out at Lincoln Park with an excavator and chainsaws – operated by the state Ecology Department’s Washington Conservation Corps – to remove what was estimated to total about eight tons of washed-up logs contaminated with creosote, long used as a preservative.
Thanks to Puget Soundkeeper’s pollution-prevention coordinator Barbara Owens for the photos; she says the downtown waterfront saw a similar project two years ago, in the Myrtle Edwards/Olympic Sculpture Parks‘ vicinity.
More wildlife sights on West Seattle beaches today, as the lowest tide once again was minus three feet, and then some. Thanks to WSB’ers who shared photos – above, Machel Spence‘s photograph of what she explained was “a rare and sweet find at low tide … an opalescent a frosted nudibranch, I don’t see these very often except for the very low tides.” The next photo is courtesy of Jen, who said she and her daughter spotted it (among other creatures) while out this afternoonn. She added, “It was so much fun and beautiful out there.”
(Do you know what that is? We don’t!) Tomorrow’s low tide won’t be as low as the past two days, but still excellent for tide-walking depending on the weather – forecast right now as “partly sunny” – it’ll be minus 2.8 feet at 2 pm.
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