Curtis Cove Report - August 11, 2013

Sunday, August 11. 6:45 PM. Low tide still a couple hrs away, but wanted to get in for the last hour of sunlight after being away for two weeks again.

There had been some energy in the past two weeks. Along the back of the foreshore were groupings & clusters of large cobbles & pebbles. A few had even pushed up toward the berm.

There were also countless sandpiper tracks -- the migratory birds had begun their long treks toward winter grounds, still here in the height of summer.

Back down at the low foreshore, where the slope broke at the back of the live-algae line, that's where the debris collected again, as with July 27th's collection. Debris carried in by high-tide waves washes gently rolled down with outwash on each receding tide. Leaving a narrow ring/band of debris trapped where the slope quickly turns from steep to gentle.

On this day, the lobstering debris was exceptionally thick. It had even overspilled its narrow band, smearing far down into the cobbles and boulders in the low foreshore. Many could be found wherever there were nooks & hollows.

I tried, in the failing sun, to get every last bit that I could find. Probably a fool's errand. But it was why I was there after all.

Then the last of the sun's rays caught a lump of quartz, illuminating it from within.

It was just what I needed at the end of a rather depressing collection.

This was the haul:

18 pcs of rope, about 20 ft total

749 pcs of nonrope debris

767 finds:

• Bldg material/furniture: 0
• Foam/styrofoam: 0
• Fishing rope/net: 18
• Fishing misc.: 650 (602 lobster trap vinyl scraps, 43 claw bands, 3 trap parts, 2 trap bumpers)
• Food-related plastics: 25 (23 cup scraps, bottlecap o-ring, straw)
• Food-related glass/metal: 2 (can scraps)
• Nonfood/unknown plastics: 14 (bag scrap, 4 glove scraps, glove, 3 plant stakes, 2 cable ties, eyeglass earpiece, 2 wall anchors)
• Scrap plastics: 54 ( 21 > 1" , 33 < 1" )
• Paper/wood: 0
• Non-plastic misc./unique: 4 (fabric pieces)

Nonfood plastics:

 Food plastics:

 And, the piece de resistance, lobster trap vinyl scraps:

The new normal.

Running YTD counts:

• Total pcs of litter -- 5997
• Pcs fishing rope -- 1780
• Vinyl lobster-trap scraps -- 2890

Curtis Cove Report - July 27, 2013

Saturday, July 27, 7:50AM. Gorgeous sunny morning, an hour before low tide. It had been two weeks since I was here last.

Everything was alive, in bloom, greening out. The backshore was ringed by beach roses; the low foreshore full of pebbles, cobbles, and even boulders. This day we were coming off one glorious week following a week of heat, heat, heat! But there had been no violent storms to speak of.

Still, there had been change over the two weeks. The pebbles at the back of the foreshore were scooped into clumps and clusters. Not particularly well-sorted -- largely jumbled, but changed

Calm weeks mean heavy, small bits of plastic here at Curtis Cove. And the motherlode was there on the mid-foreshore, near the beginning of the live algae. Where the steep slope on the back crunches into the flatter jumble of cobbles lower, the outwash slowed and the small heavy plastics fell out.

It was going to be a busy day.

11 pcs of rope, about 15 ft total

287 pcs of nonrope debris

298 finds:

• Bldg material/furniture: 0
• Foam/styrofoam: 1
• Fishing rope/net: 11
• Fishing misc.: 237 (18 claw bands, 2 fishing line, 212 vinyl scraps, 5 trap parts)
• Food-related plastics: 13 (11 cup scraps, 2 bottlecap o-rings)
• Food-related glass/metal: 0
• Nonfood/unknown plastics: 13 (2 mylar balloon scraps, toy lid/top, 3 bandaids, hairband, 2 cable ties, clothes size tag, 3 cords)
• Scrap plastics: 22 ( 6 > 1" , 16 < 1" )
• Paper/wood: 0
• Non-plastic misc./unique: 1 (seaglass)

The bites and pokes on the plastic bits were unsettling, as usual.

But the story of this day was the lobster trap vinyl.

It's going to be the story of many days, I'll bet.

Running YTD counts:

• Total pcs of litter -- 5232
• Pcs fishing rope -- 1762
• Vinyl lobster-trap scraps -- 2285

Curtis Cove Report - July 11, 2013

Thursday, July 11. 8:15AM. Lowtide, a weak one. Pea-soup fog. 70 degrees, very slight seabreeze.

Despite the gloomy day, a little color burst through.

It had been two weeks since my June 27 visit. Since then the beach had shown some movement of rocks, some energy. We were now a week past an outrageous heatwave, followed by a week of cool rain & drizzle. Nothing particularly stormy, though a few gusts. Yet there were lots of bigger cobbles -- even boulders -- down low that seemed to have been tossed around.

Better, there was now a great arrangment of pebbles & cusps at the back of the foreshore.

All arranged by nature's hand. Behind this "wall" lay a large amount of older wrack, periwinkle shells, and some of larger bits of debris.

The ocean had built a perfect breakwater/energy damper.

So, what did it deposit?

29 pcs of rope, about 40 ft total

294 pcs of nonrope debris

323 finds:

• Bldg material/furniture: 0
• Foam/styrofoam: 1
• Fishing rope/net: 29 (40 ft)
• Fishing misc.: 231 (193 lobster trap vinyl scraps, 22 trap pieces, 15 claw bands, ball of fishing line)
• Food-related plastics: 23 (16 cup scraps, 2 bottlecap o-rings, 2 bread wrapper tags, saucepack, food wrapper, straw)
• Food-related glass/metal: 0
• Nonfood/unknown plastics: 12 (Clorox bottlecap, bandaid, hairband, cable tie, camera lens cap(?), chunk of plastic rod(?), 2 wall anchors, 2 cords, 2 plant stakes)
• Scrap plastics: 24 ( 6 > 1" , 18 < 1" )
• Paper/wood: 0
• Non-plastic misc./unique: 3 (sea glass)

The lack of storms means a lack of rope. But the calmer seas means these can settle out:

I'm on pace this year to beat last year's 5245 scraps of dead lobster trap. Gentle summer waves bring them in and deposit them behind.

Rope, or vinyl? Take your pick.

They never, ever go away.

Running YTD counts:

• Total pcs of litter -- 4934
• Pcs fishing rope -- 1751
• Vinyl lobster-trap scraps -- 2073

Curtis Cove Report - June 27, 2013

Thursday June 27, 9AM. Low-tide 2 weeks since last visit. Stormy day the day or two before. Overcast & wet skies.

Green algae healthy on the low foreshore shows that the recent storms didn't have a lot of ripping/tugging energy. Life quickly growing back into the pulverized backshore:

A day of contrasts. The tide pools high up, away from the rotting wrack, were crystal clear, beautiful, and full of life:

The tide pools caught in the line of runoff were miasmas, dead.

There's such a thing as too much nutrients -- too much of a good thing! As well as, of course, way too much of a bad thing:

The smear of tiny plastics spread throughout the fine pulverized wrack on the foreshore told me this would be a busy day. All told, here's what I collected:

67 pcs of rope, about 80 ft total

252 pcs of nonrope debris

300 finds:

• Bldg material/furniture: 0
• Foam/styrofoam: 1
• Fishing rope/net: 67 (80 ft)
• Fishing misc.: 158 (127 vinyl lobster trap coating scraps, 15 trap parts, 2 bumpers/cleats, 13 clawbands, buoy-stick scrap)
• Food-related plastics: 21 (19 cup scraps, 2 food wrappers)
• Food-related glass/metal: 3 (can scraps)
• Nonfood/unknown plastics: 11 (3 straps, vinyl stitching, old flanged tube, cable tie, 5 cords)
• Scrap plastics: 36 ( 20 >1" , 16 < 1" )
• Paper/wood: 0
• Non-plastic misc./unique: 3 (fabric scrap, 2 sea glass)

All of the above that I found is new -- it's not the remnants of winter storms filtering back into the sea. This is just new stuff that the sea is continually dumping on the shores of Curtis Cove. A couple of the more curious items:

-Ancient- plastic chair/table foot

Badly fish-eaten lobster claw bands

We keep giving it to the ocean. The ocean keeps giving it to us.

Running YTD counts:

• Total pcs of litter -- 4611
• Pcs fishing rope -- 1722
• Vinyl lobster-trap scraps -- 1880

Curtis Cove Report - June 21, 2013

After a July filled with unforeseen challenges & setbacks, The Flotsam Diaries is back in the saddle!

And back with far too many collection reports to catch up on. In the interest of at least getting them done, please excuse the brevity of the next several, starting with this.

Friday, June 21. 3:15PM. Going on low-tide. Bright sunshine, a few clouds, mild breeze.

Brought my daughter, who had a blast scouring the pebbles and exploring.

By this day, lots of life was already growing throughout the backshore. Nature was quickly healing the damage from winter's storms. It was clearly a low-energy week at the beach. Little changed from before, with no large clusters of rocks or clumps of algae tossed up.

In the end, a calm week. Much of the plastic I found lay higher up, possibly teased out from the very last rotting of winter's wrack.

The haul for the day:

28 pcs of rope, about 25 ft total

124 pcs of nonrope debris

152 finds:

• Bldg material/furniture: 0
• Foam/styrofoam: 0
• Fishing rope/net: 28
• Fishing misc.: 73 (52 vinyl trap coating scraps, 3 bumpers/cleats, 3 bait bags, trap tag, 4 trap parts, 9 claw bands, balled-up fishing line)
• Food-related plastics: 13 (bottle scrap, bottlecap seal, 7 cup scraps, 2 bread tags, one "buttery spread" pack, fork handle)
• Food-related glass/metal: 1 (bottlecap)
• Nonfood/unknown plastics: 16 (waxed floss, hair clip, 2 bandaids, 4 cable ties, cord, lens cover (?), woven material, crate seal, duct tape, 2 end caps, medicine blister pack)
• Scrap plastics: 16 ( 5 > 1" , 11 < 1" )
• Paper/wood: 0
• Non-plastic misc./unique: 5 (4 seaglass, fabric scrap)

By numbers, a fairly low-trash day for Curtis Cove. But interesting nonetheless. This bread tag, stamped "July 14," certainly didn't mean July 14, 2013:

This coffee-cup lid (which is polystyrene and sinks in seawater) shows evidence of a -lot- of bites & nips from its time at sea:

I'm forever finding these crate seals washing up. I'm assuming they probably have something to do with fishing -- everything that washes up in Maine on a large scale seems to. But I'm not sure what. Crated bait, cut open at sea maybe?

I wonder what small person lost this bandaid. On what beach. In what year?

Stop and look at the next thing you find washed in. It's got a story to tell.

Running YTD counts:

• Total pcs of litter -- 4311
• Pcs fishing rope -- 1655
• Vinyl lobster-trap scraps -- 1753

Curtis Cove Report - June 13, 2013

Thursday, June 13. 9:30 AM. Mid-60s and on its way up. Light breeze, 1/2 hour before low tide, bright sun... Bring on summer!

And still all to myself

Long lines of clouds in the sky, reverberating energy up and down just like a plucked guitar string -- or a pebble thrown in the ocean.

"Gravity Waves"

It had been a mostly low-energy couple of weeks since my last visit, with a healed summer slope to the beach as a whole. The backshore, so ravaged in February, was back & in blossom.

The low foreshore, heavily saturated by a week of heavy & steady rains, swirled with standing pools and life.

Walking along the backshore, my feet sank into fresh sand that had been blown or washed on top of the last remnants of winter's wrack. Bits of rope stuck out of the mid-foreshore, signs that their overburden had been stripped off (and then tossed onto the backshore). What would that mean for any washed-in plastic? Well, you tell me.

184 pcs of rope, about 140 ft total

158 pcs of nonrope debris

342 finds:

• Bldg material/furniture: 2 (fiberglass fragments)
• Foam/styrofoam: 0
• Fishing rope/net: 184
• Fishing misc.: 81 (61 vinyl trap scraps, 8 bait bags/scraps, 2 bumpers, 2 trap parts, 3 balls of fishing line, 4 claw bands, trap tag)
• Food-related plastics: 19 (bottlecap seal, bottle, 14 cup scraps, bread wrapper tag, tiny plate scrap, straw)
• Food-related glass/metal: 3 (2 aluminum can scraps, seaglass)
• Nonfood/unknown plastics: 29 (6 bag scraps, 3 mylar balloon scraps, Clorox bottlecap scrap, nonfood bottlecap, hair band, 2 very old/broken toy scraps, 7 cords, 2 rubber belts/straps, 2 woven straps, plant ID stake, 3 cable ties)
• Scrap plastics: 18 ( 10 > 1" , 8 < 1" )
• Paper/wood: 1 (paper backing/lining)
• Non-plastic misc./unique: 5 (3 fabric scraps, 1"Lobster Cove" scrap, shoelace)

More of the usual. And maybe a little unusual:

The steel inside this large lobster trap scrap has all rusted away. All that's left is the permanent, nondegradable vinyl coating. How long would it take to do that, do you think?

And of course, more subtle evidence of commercial fishing's effects on the Gulf of Maine:

Bleach bottles and bleach bottlecaps are common finds. After sanitizing decks & work surfaces on a rocking boat, bleach bottles are often accidentally (or not accidentally) dumped overboard. They don't go away.

Neither do the plastic remnants of early mornings out to sea.

I have found dozens -- or hundreds -- of scraps of coffeecups and cup lids washed up on my one shore. (Many or most with sea-creature bite & poke marks on them.) More than could be accounted for by seaside strollers. Coffee is an excellent 5AM wake-up for a long day at sea. But pitching a coffee cup overboard when the coffee's gone is bad form.

Running YTD counts:

• Total pcs of litter -- 4159
• Pcs fishing rope -- 1627
• Vinyl lobster-trap scraps -- 1701

Curtis Cove Report - May 28, 2013

Tuesday May 28, 2013. 8:15AM. Bright sun, a few clouds off coast. Upper 50s. Incredibly low low tide. Water receded out in places 50+ feet further out than I'd ever seen.

Standing on the northern side of the cove I could almost hop across to the south!

Even with all this exposed, I at first was a bit disappointed by what seemed like not a lot of life. But as always, the key is to look closer. Here is a sandworm wriggling back into the mud, while the sand-cast of another lies like spaghetti next to it.

And a lovely surprise -- a "bushy-backed nudibranch"! A kind of shell-less snail that you can find in intertidal areas if you're lucky

And then, the reason I started visiting beaches in earnest 3+ years ago. Plastic. These are the ubiquitous bits of vinyl from rotted lobster traps that I find every week in the tide pools.

 Higher up on the beach, what have we here? The string to a balloon?

Nope. The entire balloon, mylar.

Another week, another remnant of someone's celebration washing up.

On to the finds...

(Same tech disaster that killed my May 15 rope photo killed May 28.)

68 pcs of fishing rope, about 80 ft overall

69 pcs of nonrope debris

137 finds:

• Bldg material/furniture: 0
• Foam/styrofoam: 0
• Fishing rope/net: 68
• Fishing misc.: 39 (5 bumpers, 19 vinyl trap coatings, 3 bait bag scraps, 8 trap parts, vent, fishing line, claw band, rope connector rod)
• Food-related plastics: 12 (2 bottle caps, 2 bottles, 7 cup scraps, triangle-cut sandwich container)
• Food-related glass/metal: 3 (can scrap, 2 sea glass)
• Nonfood/unknown plastics: 10 (mylar balloon, large rug offcut, 2 flowers, fabric scrap, 5 cable ties)
• Scrap plastics: 4 ( all > 1" )
• Paper/wood: 0
• Non-plastic misc./unique: 1 (shoe string)

blah blah

Fake flowers never die.

Drink bottles have a rough life on the seabed. But it's even rougher for the sea creatures that eat chunks of sharp rigid plastic.

When even multi-pour salt shakers are made of plastic, they leave a plastic legacy in the ocean.

Running YTD counts:

• Total pcs of litter -- 3817
• Pcs fishing rope -- 1443
• Vinyl lobster-trap scraps -- 1640