(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.

Under the pilings alongside Cove Park, the pocket beach north of the Fauntleroy ferry dock, we were “seeing stars” at the tide’s lowest point about an hour and a half ago. We went to Cove Park because soon it will be off-limits for two years of pump-station work. Our favorite sight: The tracks made by a small sun star:

If you watched the star itself, you could barely tell it was moving, but the tracks in the wet sand showed its progress added up (a handy thought for those projects that seem to take forever). Tomorrow afternoon’s low tide will be almost as low as today.

A few bonus reasons to go outside the next several days/nights … very low and very high tides, plus the “supermoon”! The latter arrives at moonrise Saturday evening – Space.com has details. And along with this month’s full moon come some very high and very low tides. Today’s low tide at midmorning – when we took the cameraphone photo above, during a brief Alki visit – was a modestly low minus tide, but as our favorite monthly tide table shows, the lows get lower over the next few days, bottoming out at -3.4 just after noon on Monday (one of the lowest daytime low tides of the year). At the same time, the high tides are higher than usual, topping out at 12 feet (or slightly past that) Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday evenings.

SIDE NOTE: Any time you are interested in sunrise/set, moonrise/set, and tide information, that’s part of what we provide (automated so you can trust it’s always updated) on the WSB Weather page – follow that link OR click the “Weather” tab below the header on any WSB page.

You never know what you are going to find on the beach at low tide. This closeup look at an octopus arm found south of Alki Point a few days ago is courtesy of West Seattle photographer Machel Spence. She even found the upper mandible of its beak – the only hard part of an octopus’s body:

Probably not the same octopus – but two weeks ago, Jana and her kids found an intact octopus on a local beach; we’d been saving those photos – click ahead if you’re interested in seeing one:

Almost everything you need to know about octopuses, including fun facts, is here.

It seems to be an annual Alki occurrence – looking back a few years into our archives – the morning after the first major sunshine, the beach park has trash trouble. John sent the photo, taken this morning east of Alki Bathhouse, noted, “Obviously the trash wasn’t emptied during the day yesterday … the whole boardwalk area is disgusting!” We checked with Seattle Parks to find out about this year’s maintenance plan, given yet another round of city budget-belt-tightening. Spokesperson Dewey Potter says yes, John is right – trash wasn’t emptied on Sunday, because crews won’t be on the summer schedule for another month: “Our crew, because of budget reductions, is on a Monday through Friday schedule until the summer seasonals start work at the end of May. The crew should be finished cleaning up Alki Beach by now. Not all the cans were full, which means people were just discarding trash. Sad, on Earth Day weekend.”

TUESDAY MORNING: We received some new info from Parks – here – including, they’re adding cans.

(Marination’s Roz Edison and Kamala Saxton, with Alki CC president Tony Fragada at right)
Marination proprietors Roz Edison and Kamala Saxton stole the show at last night’s Alki Community Council meeting, with an update on the sudden red-tape snag that pushed back their Seacrest Boathouse project – but that wasn’t the only meaty briefing on the agenda:

MARINATION/SEACREST UPDATE: Edison and Saxton came to the ACC meeting to update the group on the Seacrest situation (taking a break from their celebration of the first anniversary of their first bricks-and-mortar location, which is on Capitol Hill). They noted for those unfamiliar with their business that their food truck has been serving West Seattle for three years – usually selling out of food during its Saturday visits to 35th/Graham.

If you missed our most recent update – after they were chosen as Seacrest’s new restaurant concessionaire in a city Request for Proposals process, after previous concessionaire Alki Crab and Fish moved out, they suddenly were told that the city Department of Planning and Development had to review the project for an additional permit – because it had never been officially designated for restaurant use (despite the fact that’s what had been there for a decade-plus). In our last update, Marination wasn’t very hopeful of being able to open before late summer.

Last night, Edison described the situation as “a little incredible” – but had some good news for their supporters: She said they’ve been told “instead of being a 4-month review process, they’ll make it a 2-month review process,” after fairly high-level intervention involving both departments (Parks and DPD). Some “technicalities are being sorted out,” Edison said, and then they will be able to go The estimate is now “mid- to possibly late summer.” ACC attendees expressed regret. The restaurateurs/food-truck operators agreed: “There’s no one winning … Alki Crab and Fish could have stayed in business till this was resolved. Even DPD land use didn’t win – we would have paid the permit fee that much sooner.”

As previously reported here, Alki Kayak Tours is continuing to operate under a temporary agreement. One attendee asked why AKT can’t just be a direct concessionaire with the city, and Roz said that’s a good question – it seems Parks just prefers to have one concessionaire be a single point of contact. Edison and Saxton say there’s a lot of work to be done but during “this waiting period,” as Kamala put it, their contractors can’t even go in and do work. The Health Department has approved their plans, but everything is just waiting on the shoreline use permit, land use, and construction permits.

Asked if they might consider bringing their truck “Big Blue” to Alki in the meantime, Edison said they have it locked into a route “we’re pretty loyal to” – including the Saturday stops in High Point – so can’t change now, but once things get closer, they do hope to bring it here. They say they have had their liquor license approved already. They promise “we are wedded to be on Alki for the long term – 10 to 20 years in this area. … If we miss part of this summer, it’s OK, because we have another 10 summers (at least) here.” Saxton also said they would love to host an ACC meeting once they’re open; asked if they would return to the council in a month with an update, they said they would love to be back with an opening date. “We don’t think there’s an evil machine working against us,” Roz insisted – it’s just the way things have turned out.

BEACH SAND: An Alki resident has been talking with the Parks Department about the addition of what he described as too-rough sand to the beach late last year. His story: He noticed trucks dumping sand “just east of the Bathhouse” late last year, saying it “didn’t look like regular sand” – but it had been spread across the beach days later, almost all the way to the brick restroom structure. He asked Parks about it, saying it consisted of “coarse sand and rocks,” at least three inches deep. He said he heard back from Dan Johnson, acting Parks division directors, who explained that beach erosion had led them to bring in “recycled sand” from play areas that were undergoing renovation. However, McMahon said, the sand wasn’t placed in the area that Parks told him had been eroded. The letter to him said that the sand would be sifted before beach season, including “hand sifters” in the volleyball-playing area, and that “more beach-appropriate sand” would be brought in. The note also included an apology that there had been no notice about the “replenishment” sand. He followed up by meeting with Parks officials at the beach three weeks ago. They told him removal wasn’t possible. But they have since told him that they’ve begun the sifting operation and plan to work on that at least weekly.

(As we mentioned at the meeting, this sounded a lot like something first reported in the WSB Forums in May 2010, which we followed up with in the news section.) The resident said he plans to keep monitoring it, and ACC members expressed their appreciation. He will come back with a status report next month.

POLICE UPDATE: Lt. Pierre Davis from the Southwest Precinct told the ACC they’re getting ready for the warmer months, with an increased police presence promised at Alki, and he repeated the mantra: “If you see something, say something,” in terms of reporting unusual events/sightings/people in neighborhoods – the more 911 calls they get, the more resources they can deploy to an area. “If we get enough complaints about suspicious behavior, suspicious people, etc., we can look at the reports and say this specific area has (lots of) calls … we need to take a closer look at that,” he said, adding something police often reiterate: Press your point with 911, even if you aren’t sure they’re taking you seriously, and repeat that police have insisted the community call to report the type of thing you’re calling to report. And yes, he replied to a question, you can call 911 to report aggressive/reckless driving (such as the speeding, wheelie-popping motorcycles that have been known to visit Alki in the summertime).

Asked about the unsolved Beach Drive murder (ongoing WSB coverage here), Lt. Davis’s reply was much the same as at last Tuesday’s West Seattle Crime Prevention Council meeting (WSB coverage here): “Detectives are following several leads … not sure where that is leading them … but the common-sense things still come to mind such as how you conduct yourself in neighborhoods, don’t go into areas that are not well-lit … (if you go out for a walk), go with somebody. … If you notice an area that is not well-lit that should be, like a street light that’s out, shrubbery that should be cut for public safety, let us know, because we have interagency meetings every month, Parks Department is there, Health Department, anything that might be (of concern) to you, we can plug (that) into every city agency … all of that stuff is good information.” He also repeated that a safety walk is in the works for Emma Schmitz Park, as has been mentioned at previous meetings, but no date is set yet; he did say it’ll happen late in the day, around 6 pm.

Before Lt. Davis spoke, ACC president Tony Fragada had reported talking with neighbors and businesspeople and hearing about increasing sightings of transients in the area, even a “family living in Schmitz Park.”

LANDSLIDE UPDATE: This is an ongoing effort for ACC. While it wasn’t a formal committee update, vice president Stone said mud removal is under way in the area near where she lives (the renowned “Flower Houses”) and the neighboring Alki Beach Towers condos. Some trees have been taken out, too, because they were in danger of coming down in a slide.

ALSO NOTED: Another reminder that Seattle Summer Streets (“car-free day”) is coming up, along with the West Seattle 5K (co-sponsored by WSB), on May 20th … Admiral Neighborhood Association vice president Karl de Jong was visiting and told the group it’s great to “cross-pollinate” neighborhood groups. He was asked about the campaign for a light at 47th/Admiral, which he says is 32nd of 33 on a city list that seems to be getting addressed at the rate of about two lights a year. He mentioned the demonstration they had last fall (WSB coverage here) to mark the fifth anniversary of the deadly pedestrian crash that killed Tatsuo Nakata in 2006, and he asked anyone with ideas about how to advance the signal campaign to please let ANA know – they’re trying to find “creative ways … to keep the city from saying ‘no’.”

The Alki Community Council meets on third Thursdays, 7 pm, Alki UCC Church; more info at alkinews.com.

Another orca-sighting alert (via Elissa, on the WSB Facebook wall) sent us down to Beach Drive to take a look – but this was the only black-and-white-marked wildlife group we spotted – the beautiful brant who come here to eat eelgrass. (Here’s what Alki resident Guy Smith wrote about them for WSB in fall 2009. Note – brant are easily spooked, so if you see them, shhh!) The whale tips came from multiple sources; though we never saw them, that’s par for our course, but others including Jeff Hogan from Killer Whale Tales, plus two city Park Rangers, had better luck. And Orca Network‘s Facebook page says two pods may be in the Sound today. Meantime, the lowest tide of the month (-2.3 feet) is bottoming out right about now; if you have the chance to tidewalk tomorrow, it’ll be almost this low (-2.1 feet) at 2:23 pm – here’s the chart.

(Photos by WSB co-publisher Patrick Sand)
A sad procession on Alki less than an hour ago – but one that might ultimately yield some knowledge for the future: A dead harbor porpoise was taken away by biologist Dyanna Lambourn from the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife Marine Mammal Investigations unit and biologist/stranding coordinator Jessie Huggins from Cascadia Research Collective. Also on hand at the beach this morning, Seal Sitters first responder Robin Lindsey, who got word of the porpoise’s death at mid-afternoon Saturday (the organization is part of a stranding network for all marine mammals, not just seals), and Seal Sitters volunteers David and Eilene Hutchinson. So far we know the porpoise was an adult female, but the cause of her death was not obvious and will require further investigation.

As the biologists (in the photo with camera-wielding Robin) explained to curious passersby, harbor porpoises are not rare and not endangered (read more about them here), but the biologists say they seldom wash up like this – most often, they die at sea and “just disappear.” On the Seal Sitters’ “blubberblog” site, Robin tells the story of the elaborate operation carried out last night to secure the porpoise until it could be picked up this morning; as she writes, it died further east along the Alki shore, and was moved to the spot where we photographed her and the biologists this morning (near the 53rd Avenue Pump Station section of beach). The porpoise is now being taken to a facility in the South Sound.

3:47 PM UPDATE: Robin has updated her report, but the necropsy results aren’t in yet – look for another update (there and here) when they are.

11:03 PM UPDATE: Robin at Seal Sitters has updated her report again with those results. Biologists say the porpoise had a serious lung infection. Full details added at the bottom of her story.

One more cleanup to note before the weekend’s out – this one, underwater. After weeks of bringing up old batteries (as featured on TV this past week), West Seattle diver/photographer Laura James and friends have moved on to plastic sheets/tarps that Laura says are littering the sea floor.

She’s not sure if plastics recyclers will be able to take the sheets, but she plans to check.

(Click for larger view)
Another peek at a world that’s all around us, yet so small it’s all but out of sight: Photographer Machel Spence explains her image:

I just had to share this because it’s pretty darn amazing! It’s a phantom shrimp I happened to come across down by the water; they are also called skeleton shrimps … this one was fairly small (1/2 an inch) but they can get up to 2 inches. She has a brood pouch too, which I personally have never actually seen with my own eyes (just in books). In the past, I have come across large colonies of these but they move around so much, they can be hard to photograph, but this beautiful girl just stayed completely still (pretty awesome moment!) It was on a piece of eelgrass down at Alki. They are not actually shrimps but amphipods.

(More info about them can be found here.)

(June 2011 photo by Jim Clark)
What could be better than walking West Seattle beaches during low-low tides and enjoying sights like that? How about – being there during low-low tides as a volunteer beach naturalist, to help others learn about the beach and how to be careful while on it! Here’s your chance:

Care about beaches? Good with people? Sign up to be a volunteer beach naturalist with the Seattle Aquarium at a Seattle-area beach this summer. Naturalists will attend a program orientation on Tuesday, March 13, and receive training from marine and interpretative experts on five weekday evenings (3/20, 4/4, 4/17, 4/24, 5/1) and three weekend days (3/25, 4/7, 5/6). Once trained, volunteers spend three summer days educating visitors about beach ecology and beach etiquette at Carkeek Park, Constellation Park (Alki), Des Moines Beach Park, Golden Gardens, Lincoln Park, Olympic Sculpture Park Beach, Redondo Beach, Richmond Beach, or Seahurst Park. To sign up or get more information, please e-mail beachnaturalist@seattleaquarium.org or call (206) 386.4365.

While volunteering for Seal Sitters in the Lincoln Park vicinity recently, Alki-based photographer David Hutchinson got a close-up look at the famous white geese who live in the area. (They’ve been discussed on WSB before, but never with such a striking photo – thanks!)