Beach COMBERS

On this quiet August morning, California’s Carmel Beach is shrouded in a soft fog. The tide is low, and the receding waters have left behind the usual clumps of intriguing seaweed and tantalizing bits of shell. But my walking partner and I are hunting for other biological treasures. We are Monterey Bay Beach COMBERS, trained volunteers who once a month scour sections of the California coast in search of marine creatures. With binoculars, collection bags, datasheets, identification books and permits in hand, we seek, record and at times collect dead animals that still might have much to say about what is happening to California’s ever-changing coastal environment.

In 1997, Marine biologists Scott Benson and Jim Harvey at the Moss Landing Marine Laboratories, Andrew deVolgelaere at the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary and Jack Ames at the California Department of Fish and Game started this group in collaboration with the Marine Wildlife Veterinary Care and Research Center. Their aim was to regularly gather information about when, where and how often marine species are cast onto various points along Monterey Bay’s shores. The volunteers then provide these data to the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary, which uses the information to rapidly predict mortality rates from natural and human-caused events such as changes in weather patterns, red tides and oil spills.

Beach COMBERS (Coastal Ocean Mammal and Bird Education and Research Surveys) has since grown to about 100 volunteers, two members per beach. We shuttle any dead specimens that might be particularly valuable back to the Moss Landing Marine Laboratories and other research facilities, and we quickly notify marine animal rescue groups if we find any stranded animals that are still alive. This morning, my partner and I have encountered something truly unique: a fairly intact, dead baby shark that, from a distance, looks like a great white.

Scrambling through the sand, we pounce towards our beach-cast bounty. Even in its diminutive form, this animal is impressive, having rows of razor sharp teeth adorning its tapered snout. Its body is pewter gray, its underbelly a dusky white and on its pelvic fins are specialized appendages called claspers that males insert into females during mating. At roughly three feet (90 centimeters) long, this little fellow must have been only a few months old when he met his untimely demise.

We call shark specialists at Stanford University's Hopkins Marine Lab just a few miles down the road who tell us we have actually found a salmon shark pup, identifiable in part by two keel-like structures running along the base of its tail. Researchers still don't know where these large Pacific sharks—which roam from Hawaii to Alaska—give birth, so finding this pup here is a precious discovery. Learning this, we gently place our treasure in a plastic bag to be given to the shark researchers once we've completed the day's survey. What a remarkable day on the beach, and it's not even 8:30 a.m.!

SeaWeb Ocean Voice dead salmon shark on Carmel Beach, Calif.

Salmon sharks, which have body temperatures that can be 38 degrees Fahrenheit (21 degrees Celsius) above surrounding ocean waters and can swim from Alaska to Hawaii, are a rare find on California’s beaches.
Tierney Thys

Working with Beach COMBERS has done something rather magical to my sense of time and place by putting my own busy calendar within that of the ocean’s. I can now even mark the seasons by the cast of characters that wash ashore. During March through May, we record more grebes as the loons and scoters start to fly north to breed. We also see fewer fulmars and kittiwakes, which have already begun their trek north to breeding colonies in Alaska. We encounter more murres and sooty shearwaters between May and September. And in July, we often record brown pelicans and Heerman's gulls, just up from their breeding areas in the Channel Islands off Southern California and Baja. Since joining Beach COMBERS, the seasons have all sprouted wings.

I find this work particularly exciting because the data we collect don't just pile up in an office: they are quickly analyzed, posted online on the Beach COMBERS Web site for anyone to see and many times lead directly to action. For example, by keeping records of seabirds and marine mammals entangled in fishing line, our volunteers helped identify the damaging effects of gill-net fisheries on California marine wildlife. In response, the California Department of Fish and Game limited the fishery to waters greater than about 180 feet (60 meters), which dramatically reduced entanglements. Also by documenting animals that algal blooms have afflicted, our volunteers can collect vital information on events like red tides. And through mapping the location of and collecting tar balls and oiled birds, we help determine the long-lasting impacts of oil spills.

Scouring the beach for the dead may sound a bit grisly, but my work with Beach COMBERS has made me feel more intimately connected to the ocean than nearly all the other work I have done for marine research and conservation during the past 10 years. Being part of this small, dedicated group of volunteers has also shown me firsthand how hungry the public is to participate in conservation and research, and how much well-organized citizen science programs can contribute. Such work can maintain vital long-term monitoring and perpetuate scientific discovery, even in the face of dwindling governmental funding and resources for hiring full-time monitoring staff. What a difference just one day a month can make!

Zoologist Tierney Thys is a National Geographic Emerging Explorer and world expert on the giant ocean sunfish Mola mola. For 10 years, she worked at Sea Studios Foundation to develop award-winning documentaries, outreach programs and a citizen science program devoted to documenting the spread of invasive species. In addition to working independently on documentaries, Thys is now writing educational children’s books.

To find out about how to sign up to participate in the International Coastal Cleanup Day, see: www.oceanconservancy.org

Other Ocean Voices>>>

Beach COMBERS Discover Biological Treasures

“I am continually impressed and buoyed by the power

of small groups of concerned citizens to make

positive changes in the world.”

—Tierney Thys, Zoologist and Filmmaker

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