Another Hot Day at the Beach

It was already 80 F, windless and sultry when we got down to the beach this morning before 9 AM.  Not a cloud in the sky.

FWIW, the Sea Nettle probability is still pegged at 100%.  This enormous mass of them collects behind the jetty at Flag Harbor.  The rest of the beach is bad but not quite this bad.  Enough to discourage barefoot wading, though.

Fortunately for Skye, her thick fur keeps the nettles off her skin.  This is about as deep as she'll go (voluntarily), and she did a lot of wading to beat the heat today.  As it was, she was getting pretty miserable, and we turned back early, fearing that she was overheating.  But she's fine, after a shower and a nap.

The Weed du Jour.  It seems to be about the only wildflower flowering this time of year.  I'm still trying to figure out what it is.

It has pretty yellow flowers, that continue to emerge from the top of the long stem.  It'll probably turn out to be some horrible invasive weed; it seems like most of the stuff that does well in the cliffs is.

Fellow shark's tooth hunters.  Actually, a boy with them turned out to be a fisherman of sorts, when we came back he had a Skilletfish in his bucket which I identified for him.

Only a few small sharks teeth today, and one drums tooth; nothing picture worthy.

Another fisherman (or is it a fisherwoman?) perched on the root ball of a tree deposited in shallow water by Tropical Storm Lee last year.  Almost time for more storms to come and shuffle the trash around and let a few new fossils out of the cliffs. We saw lots of Ospreys, and maybe one eagle, at a distance.

Someone kayak fishing in the channel at Flag Harbor.  I didn't see him catch any fish, but I did see him try, unsuccessfully, to bring in one of the boulders that make up the jetty.  10 lb test won't cut it.

Have I Told You It's Hot at the Beach?

Well it is.  84 F (and extremely sticky) here at 8 AM.  No breeze at all.

The couple in the water had biked 60 miles down from the north last night, and camped on the beach over night.  More power to them.  When we came back up the beach, they had cleaned up their camp completely and were on their way back.

Time to get a little sun before it gets completely miserable. 

We've met Theresa and Roy plenty of times before.  They're serious shark's teeth hunters, using scoops and wading out where the big ones lay.  They usually have a pretty nice collection when we see them and today was no exception.  Theresa said she found a big Megalodon a couple of weeks ago.

A pretty good handful of big Snaggletooth and medium Mako teeth, not to mention a whole baggie full of small teeth.

 Have I told you it's hot here?

Probability of Sea Nettles still 100%.  They were so abundant today that you had to be pretty careful walking in the water.  I got one little sting.

Sunday Beach Report - June 24, 2012

A pretty nice day at the beach again, but the heat and humidity are trying to creep back in.

We had a visitor from the north on the beach today. 

Skye and Red checked him out, and pronounced him safe.  Red even tried to invite him off for a swim, but we decided to keep him dry in case some kid came back for him.

The Ospreys were not as pervasive today; I saw a couple a a distance, but this eagle was out hunting, which might discourage the Ospreys, since an eagle would rather steal from Ospreys than do it's own work any day.  There's a lesson there...

It's the height of Wineberry season.  Wineberry (Rubus phoenicolasius), is a raspberry native to Asia, which has become a widespread invasive in the US.  They like road edges, and disturbed areas like the cliffs.  They're edible, and good, but not really as good as regular raspberries.

An unusually elaborate driftwood structure.  A sun shelter (throw a blanket over it and it becomes shade)?  Or a fake jail?

The girls dipping their toes, and more, in the water.  Fossil collecting was slow, but slightly better than yesterday; nothing picture worthy, however.

Joel and Red discuss dogs with a family down at the beach.

Fine Day at the Beach 6/3/12

I just wish the weather could stay like this all summer.  Sunny, but with puffy clouds (yes, they have a scientific name; screw it). Mid 70s, breezy but not windy.  This is actually a picture from the end of the walk, when Skye decided she'd rather go back down the beach with Red and Joel than go home.  Either that, or she was confused.  She's not saying.

 A perfect day for a father-son kayaking expedition.

 Or professional shark's tooth hunting.  He had scuba gear, but now he's pulling the anchor, either to go to a new site, or give for the day.

 I found lot's of shark's teeth, unfortunately all small.  This is some kind of bone with a distinctive shape; it may be part of a jaw.  I'd like to figure it out; if you know, send a line.

 A perfect day for a sail.

 A small school of bait fish (likely Menhaden, but maybe Bay Anchovy) in shallow water.

 A good day for a sand castle.

Or maybe just a pet or head rub followed by a treat.

Oh My, What a Morning at the Beach

Oh my, what a morning!  Sunny, warm, but not too warm, not too humid and just the right amount of breeze.  Weather doesn't get any better than this.

Skye decided that these sun bathers needed checking out.













The water has warmed up to comfortable wading temperatures.  We waded around looking for shark's teeth, but it wasn't really good day for us.











However, Joel brought the big one he found last week for our viewing pleasure.  This is a once a year grade tooth, a fine specimen of what we call the extinct Mako, but which is likely a precursor to the modern Great White Shark.




A good day for a ride on a jet ski.

Or to paddle around in the shallows while silly dad looks for sharks teeth

 Or to paddle around in a kayak.













The flower of the day.  I still haven't figured out what this is.  It's a shrub with leaves like a Black Locust, but a very different flower.

I also took a picture with a flash, and it looked very different, because the flash brought out the purple in the flower, and somehow diminished the orange.

Back to the Beach

The conditions here this morning were pretty much the same as in Anchorage two mornings ago, cloudy and rainy, except for that temperature thing.  It was more like 70 F here instead of 40 F.  Shorts and T-shirt weather instead of jeans and flannel shirts.

An interesting version of the beach's colors, courtesy of Paintshop Pro's temperature correction.  It looks a little too pink to me.

Skye was pretty happy to see us, and clung pretty close last night.  But she was raring to get back down to the beach.  We met Joel and Red on our way back, and filled Joel with some misinformation about the cruise, or at least Georgia did.

The flower du jour was the Japanese Honeysuckle, a common invasive species in the US.  I remember sipping nectar from these as a kid back in Los Angeles.  It's probably illegal to do that now.

This helicopter made a pretty low pass just off shore.  I assume from the lack of markings that it's military, probably from Patuxent River Naval Air Station, just down the bay, but I don't know for sure.  That's pretty much a stock response when something odd flies by here.

Georgia won the prize for the best fossils of the day with these, a large Snaggletooth shark tooth (on the right), and a crocodile tooth (on the left).  Joel had found a huge Mako tooth over the week and still had it to show us, a once a year type tooth, but foolishly, I didn't ask to take a picture of it.

Cool and Crisp at the Beach

After the passage of the front that soaked Trevor and I last evening, today's weather came clear and cool.  It was only about 50 F when we started our walk, but the breeze was slight, and the Bay had only a light chop.

We met one of our neighbors, his son and his two labs on the beach.  The dogs all got along fine (after Skye growled a little to attempt to assert her dominance - they ignored her).

 The labs do labby things, like fetch sticks.  Skye doesn't fetch. If you throw it, she figures you don't want it.  Sometimes she will deign to try to intimidate a dog to drop it's toy, but then she doesn't really want so she drops again quickly.  Huskies; built to pull sleds and not ask too many questions.

The tide was high, so on the way north we had to climb the stairs and go through Calvert Beach.  Looking south from the top of the beach steps.

There were a bunch of these butterflies out today.  Last night a couple of them were hanging around the boat, but today on the beach they were everywhere.  They appear to be "Red Admirals", Vanessa atalanta.  I also noticed them today in the garden, but they weren't nearly as abundant as on the beach.

On the way back south, we waded through the shallow water at the narrow spot; Skye was happier to stay off leash (most of the time).  It was a decent fossil day today; we found 48 shark's teeth (mostly pretty small), a drum's tooth, and some ray plates, bringing the final total for April to 196 shark's teeth.

 A cormorant resting on the jetty, with mirage distorting James Island and a couple of boats in the distance.