Black Skimmers of Radio Road

BlackSkimmer Composite

Radio Road is birders term for some sewage treatment ponds located in Redwood Shores California. It's a popular destination for birders and bird photographers in the Bay Area.

On its website, the Sequoia Audubon Society says that SBSA’s landscape impoundment “is a perpetual favorite among local birders, for its fabulous numbers of waterfowl and shorebirds, and the constant hope, often fulfilled, of rarities. It is not uncommon to see over 10,000 birds from the security of your car, all close enough to be identified with binoculars (although a scope is a spectacular asset at this location. The popular SBSA “pond” that greets visitors to the plant at 1400 Radio Road, Redwood City – at the southeast end of Redwood Shores – is technically called a landscape impoundment. It was created in 1998 on the west side of the treatment plant to eliminate dust from the dry barren dirt in the area. 

The ponds at radio Road were drained sometime in 2013 due to a bird die off. It's believed the birds had the avian cholera  and thus the ponds were drained to eliminate this threat. Recently the ponds have been filled again and many birds have returned. However it looks like the sewer plant is going to rearrange their property and these ponds will be drained it about two years! That certainly looks like the end to this wonderful avian spot. 

Radio Road

Black skimmers have been observed in the Bay Area since 1994. They were first observed in California in 1962 and in 1971 in bodega Bay the first Northern California sighting. It's estimated that there is a small resident population of maybe 30 to 50 birds in and around the south bay. The radio Road area is perhaps the northern most boundary. I did observe 2 skimmers one time at the pillar point Harbor.  They have been hanging around radio road for at least the last seven years at least that's the first time I've seen them. It's been pretty certain that a visit to radio Road will be rewarded by seeing these birds.

Mixed Flock Skimmers and Shoveler.	Black Skimmer in Flight!
Skimmers hang together on little Islands!	Time for a big swallow of H2O!
Skimmers love flying in mixed flocks!	Sometimes they fly in formation around the ponds!

El Niño Accelerates Coastal Erosion!

Rip-rap Permeates Pacifica Bluffs

El Niño may have not lived up to some of the early hype but the accompanying high ocean swells have reigned havoc along the California Coast!

Pacifica is totally bordered by the ocean along it's entire western side. Most of the land hugging the coast is crumbling sandstone cliffs in a constant state of retreat.

A group of large apartments located on Esplanade Street in Pacifica has made national news this year and in the past due to erosion threatening the entire buildings. The apartment complex was constructed sometime before 1972 and the land in front of the buildings has been retreating steadily over the years. In 2010 2 Esplanade buildings were red-tagged and the tenants evacuated. Recently 3/16/16 a 3rd building was yellow-tagged and the tenants ordered out. At the same time the two buildings condemned in 2010 were demolished by the city of Pacifica. It's likely the 3rd and last apartment in this complex will be demolished shortly and this saga will end.

Monster Wave Beach Boulevard
Pacifica California

Esplanade Apartments 1972

The most visual and exciting place to see high surf in action is right down at the Pacifica Pier located on Beach Boulevard in Pacifica California!  The pier has been famous for years as many people flock to it during high surf conditions and it often makes the evening news with spectacular waves. This year has been one of the more spectacular for wave action and destruction. Beach Boulevard and the adjacent houses have been pounded and damaged this year and the future of Pacifica Pier is in question. North of the pier near the Esplanade Apartments are several homes also under attack and near total destruction. A little further south is the Rockaway Beach area, another pocket type beach with spectacular surf and potential for major damage and erosion.

The End of 310 Esplanade

Surfers Beach

Emergency Repair Surfers Beach

Figure 4. Surfers Beach at High Tide

Emergency Repair, Miramar 

High Surf Pounds Miramar

The Surfers Beach area may be the most interesting site for the future of highway 1 as this location is the most critical threat to the local highway infrastructure. From Pacifica to Ano Neuvo the ocean comes closest and most threateningly to the stretch of asphalt in the Surfers Beach area.  Currently emergency repairs are under way at this location due to erosion both from the wave action as well as the breakwater effects at Pillar Point Harbor.  In the past I've seen drift wood deposited onto the roadway at surfers Beach during storms. If all the elements for the perfect storm line up, high tide, high surf advisory, low barometric pressure,  high winds this could be an interesting scenario for sure. The vulnerability of this section reminds me of the situation after the March 11, 2011 Japan tsunami when a 3 foot wave from that tsunami made landfall of the US West Coast. The waves struck at fairly low tides and was only a curiosity to locals in this area, although over 100 boats were damaged in Santa Cruz as the result of this baby tsunami wave.  Looking at figure 4 and the 6.4  tide at that time makes me wonder what an additional 3 foot tsunami wave making the apparent tide over 9 feet would look like? We may not have to wait long to find out?

Mirada Road's Slow Trip to
Davy Jones' Locker

Miramar
A short distance south of Surfers Beach is the community of Miramar with Mirada Road separating the community from the residents and businesses. Many years ago Mirada Road ran about 1 mile further north all the way to Surfers Beach, that portion of the road is totally gone and it may take a monumental effort to keep the remaining road from the joining it's northern section in Davy Jones' Locker! Most days involving a little high surf and higher tides one will witness the ocean splashing and clawing at Mirada Road. Recently the wave action started to erode the south end of Mirada near the pedestrian bridge threatening some businesses and residents and forcing the closure of the pedestrian bridge.

Gazos Creek Beach

I'm on a survey team sponsored by FMSA Farallones Marine Sanctuary Association funded by NOAA! I've been involved in this survey on a monthly basis for about 6 years. Beaches along the California coast are in a constant state of sand erosion and deposition depending on season and weather conditions. It's not unusual to see 10 feet of sand raked off the beach and redeposited later at another section.  The December storms have dramatically changed the landscape of Gazos to an extent I've never witnessed before. The total beach is about 2 miles long and during most surveys access is pretty easy and the entire beach can be walked on medium to hard sand. On the December 2016 survey after heavy rains and surf this beach had dramatically changed. We could only access about 20% of the entire beach, the north end was completely blocked off with waves running all the way to the bluffs.

Gazos Creek Normal Appearance 

Same Area as Above after December 2016 Storms

El Niño Less Than Perfect!

Relentless Surf Pounds California Coast

As our winter slides to a conclusion it's worth a look at the impact El Niño has had on the San Francisco Bay Area with respect to the drought, Climate Change and coastal erosion!

After 3-4 years of below precipitation the rains of 2015-16 has brought the SF bay Area back to more normal conditions! As of March 14, 2016 the annual precipitation is normal or above for many Bay Area locations. The rains started seriously in December and continued into January, however February was close to totally dry and put a large damper on the El Niño effect. Fortunately March has given  El Niño new life in the early going but looking at future projections, this may be indeed the swan song for  El Niño 2015-16. The consensus seems to be  El Niño did not live up to the initial hype and fell short of the 1982-83 and 1997-98 El Niños.

I'm pretty much convinced that our 4 year drought is not a ephemeral aberration but rather an indication of our future climate as a result of human caused Climate Change. There has been droughts in the past and I've lived thru a fairly intense drought in the 1970's. However the difference is significant in that the current climate is warmer and more humid than in the past and seems inclined on staying this way. This dry February was an eye opener for anybody who believes we are likely to return to our normal climate. Remember the (RRR)  Ridiculously Resilient Ridge that has been parking it's self in our neighborhood and chasing all the storms north? That reappeared in February and dried the month out and elevated some temperatures into record territory!  It looks now like the rest of March will follow the same RRR pattern and thus El Niño fades into memory! NASA is reporting that February had global record-breaking temperatures by a stunning margin and warned of a 'climate emergency'.  In summary El Niño has produced welcome rain back into more normal range, however it did not generate quantities that the 1997-98 season produced. History tells us that a normal rainfall year is not dependent on  El Niño but after 4 drought years and finally a significant El Niño year and yet the rain fall is just average! So if we are now 15 years away from the next  El Niño does that mean we are looking at 15 years of sub-par rain, scary thought!

A remarkable companion to El Niño is the unusually high surf that has been pounding the California coast all winter.  The surf has been eroding the coast in spectacular fashion from Pacifica where 2 apartment buildings have been demolished, and in Miramar and Surfers Beach which are under going emergency repairs in an attempt to save the infrastructure.  In my next blog I will go into detail on coastal erosion and the effects of high surf!

King Tides Report January 21, 2016

El Niño Waves Pound Coast

Currently we are in the middle of the January King Tide event occurring 1/21/2016 thru 1/23/2016. During these events I monitor Miramar, Surfers Beach, Mavericks, and Pacifica, most notably around the Pacifica Pier.

Today at 7:52 am there was a 6.4 foot high tide. Barometric pressure was steady at 30.15 inchHg, wind was light, swells very small 2-3 feet. So today's King Tide was not very interesting due to poor conditions. However tomorrow looks like it could be very interesting on the coast. A significant storm is due in tonight and is predicted to carry on thru Friday morning at least. The surf report for Mavericks predicts 10-13 foot waves with 25-30 mph winds. High Tide will occur at 8:39 for Mavericks at about 6.4 feet.

The ocean has been more active during our  El Niño event than I've seen for many years. Recently there was very high surf that lasted for several days with spectacular wave action and damage along the coast. Beach Road in Pacifica is a street that runs parallel to the ocean around the Pacifica Pier and has been heavily damaged by the recent ocean assault and this has been widely reported in local news reports. Mirada Road, what's left of it,  is being battered on a daily basis and currently there is emergency repair work going on on the south end of the road. Mirada Road is no stranger to coastal retreat and destruction, years ago it stretched about a mile further up the coast near Surfers Beach. Constant retreat due to wave action has destroyed the portion of the road that stretched from Magellan ave to Surfers Beach. A picture of the remains of this road was featured as the cover of the book Living with the Changing California Coast! I'll be watching the action tomorrow which should be more exciting and dynamic than what was observed today.

Book Cover

 

Mirada Road, Miramar California

Monster Waves in the Pacific.....

Wave Action Pacifica Pier

....hammer the California Coast! On December 11th and 12th a High Surf Advisory was issued for the California coast with waves recorded as high as 42 feet in the Pacific. Record rains pummeled Oregon and Washington causing mud slides and flooding. On Friday December 11th I traveled to Surfers Beach near Half Moon Bay to record the action at a 5.9 foot high tide. Construction work has been on-going at Surfers Beach to address the major erosion issue near highway 1.  

Surfer Beach 12/11/15

Although the action at Surfers Beach was exciting I heard reports that the surf was off the charts in Pacifica California. I was disappointed I had chosen Surfers Beach for my photo shoot when I heard the news of Pacifica. Since the best action is at high tide I had missed the window for Pacifica.  As luck would have it the High Surf Advisory continued into the next day 12/12/15 and I headed for Pacifica at high tide!

As soon as I arrived near the Pacifica Pier I knew I was in for a treat as many of the side streets leading to the pier were closed due to flooding. I had in tow 4 cameras, a Canon 7D2 with a 10-22 wide angle lens, an Olympus E-3 with a 50-200 zoom lens, a Canon 7D with a 400 prime lens and a Panasonic video camera, not to mention my IPhone 5 smart phone. Some of my past King Tide photos have been taken during King Tides in Pacifica and I have been drenched before in the excitement of shooting and being blindsided by a wave. I've sort of come to expect a drenching in these endeavors, kind of like taking a bullet for the team!

A Single Frame from the Animated GIF

I started filming with the video camera and got a 6 minute clip of the wave action pummeling the pier and surrounding streets. The video gets more exciting at the 3 minute mark and beyond! I then started shooting with the still cameras and thought I was in a fairly safe spot after observing the wave action for awhile. The animated GIF above tells what happened next, I was totally blindsided by the biggest wave of all. I was so absorbed in the action I did not perceive the enormity of the wave about to crash on to me. I guess being oblivious to my surrounding enabled me to continue shooting and catch the entire wave frame by frame until it blanketed me......wahoo!
There was much excitement in the area, everybody was enjoying the display and you could hear owes and awes as another spectacular wave crashed ashore! I shot enough frames of a young girl having a grand time dancing and Moon Walking to the surf undulations to create the animated GIF.

Young Girl Moon Walking to the Surf

High Surf Excitement 

Snowy Plovers of Gazos Creek Beach

Snowy Plovers enjoying a temporary Gazos Creek Lake!

Gazos Creek Beach is located in San Mateo County about 60 miles south of San Francisco. To the south about 5 miles is Ano Nuevo State Reserve and two miles north is Pigeon Point Lighthouse.
I volunteer for an organization called Beach Watch (BW) which is an arm of FMSA (Farallones Marine Sanctuary Association) located at Crissy Field in the Presidio of San Francisco. BW consist of many teams of volunteers that survey beaches from Point Arena in Mendocino County to Ano Nuevo in San Mateo County twice per month. BW teams document live bird species and marine mammals as well as all dead birds, marine mammals and other creatures that perish on the beach. In addition beaches are surveyed for any signs of oil, be it from natural seep, ships and boats at sea and sunken vessels spewing oil or other hazardous materials.

For the last few years I've been documenting the Snowy Plover populations at Gazos Creek by counting the numbers and photographing all birds with leg bands that identify where the bird was born and banded.  Each month I send a short report to Point Blue (formally PRBO) in Petaluma California and to the Half Moon Bay Ranger Station. They in return send me what information they have on the banding locations of each individual.  

Official Status: Threatened, the Pacific Coast population of the western snowy plover is federally listed under the Endangered Species Act of 1973 as threatened. The western snowy plover is a Bird Species of Special Concern in California. Snowy plovers were listed as endangered under Washington Department of Game Policy No. 402 in 1981, and as threatened by the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission in 1975. The threatened status in Oregon was reaffirmed in 1989 under the Oregon Endangered Species Act.

Below are a few Snowys I've photographed on Gazos Creek Beach:

YY:AR Born and Banded at Salinas State Beach 2007 Spotted January 29th 2014 at Gazos	AO:BO Fledged Sunset State Beach 2015 Spotted at Gazos December 4th 2015
BY:GO & WO:GA Gazos 11/5/15 GO:BY banded Del Monte Beach 2015 WO:GA fledged Zmudowski State Beach 2014	AP:OA Monterey Bay Aquarium release 2014 Spotted 4 times at Gazos, latest 12/4/15
VO:BW Gazos 11/5/14 No additional sightings or information.	PV:YY Fledged Oceana Dunes 2015 Last Observation Gazos, 12/4/15

Buoys and El Niño Continued.........

Romeo Pier Peering into the Future

This blog post is a continuation of my previous post titled El Niño and Buoy 46012 Half Moon Bay Buoy 46012
I've done some further analysis of the local buoys in an attempt to see if any relationship can be established from the buoy data with respect to the current El Niño predictions. I'm not a climatologist nor do I have a background in earth climate systems. I'm just a scientifically minded citizen very concerned about the last 4 drought years and in particular the last 2 historically warm years 2014 and 2015.

I've been tracking the SF buoy in real time along with Bodega Bay, Half Moon Bay and FTPC1 Station at Crissy Field which is a ground reporting station. This is predicted as a significant rain/El Nino event as I will track and compare it to 1997-98 and 1982-83 to see how 2015 compares?

Summary of Buoy Data

Buoys transmit data hourly throughout the year which consist of wave height and periods, water and air temperatures and barometric pressures plus additional parameters. The last two El Niño events were 1982-83 and 1997-98. I’m concentrating primarily on 1997-98 because it’s most recent and I have a good recollection of that year because of the unusual and impressive rain totals. There are gaps in the buoy data and the most significant gap I encountered was the Half Moon Bay (HMB) Buoy 46012 which likely due to technical issues as no water temperature data for the entire year of 1997. However the San Francisco Buoy (SF) 46026 has more complete water temperature data up until 11/24/1997. However the water temperature data is absent for the remainder of 1997 and is absent for 1998 until 2/28/98. So there are 3 months of contiguous missing water temperature data occurring during the peak El Niño which is a little discouraging! I may in the future explore the Bodega Bay (Bodega) Buoy to see if it has more complete data.

In the general bay area waters I rely on 3 buoys, HMB, SF and Bodega and they generally follow the same temperature progression. January thru about June water temps average about 13°C and start to warm up reaching a peak in September of 15°C, then October thru December the temperatures decrease with the coming of winter back to about 13°C.

What Did 1997 Look Like? 

The 1997-1998 rainfall season was one of nearly epic proportions for San Francisco.  Numerous San Francisco records were set as the influences of an extremely strong El Niño were felt throughout the State.

SF Buoy 1997

Most notably it was the second wettest rainfall season (47.22 inches) in the 149 seasons since records began in San Francisco in 1849.  The previous second wettest season was 45.85 inches in 1889-1890.  The seasonal record remains 49.27 inches from 1861-1862; however over 24 inches of that season's total fell in the month of January 1862.  [The average seasonal rainfall (1961-1990) is 20.52 inches.]

Possibly more remarkable were the record 119 days when measurable rainfall was recorded, shattering the previous mark of 107 from the 1889-1890 season.

...http://ggweather.com/sf/sf97rain.html

Fig.4. Water Temperatures
1982/1997/2008/Present

Summary
Figure 4 is a comparison of 3 previous years, 1982 and 1997 last El Niño years and 2008 a typical year to the present year 2015. Note the 1997 data ends on November 24, 1997. All curves basically follow the same pattern peaking in the early fall and dropping as the year ends. The 1997 data deviates from that pattern showing a higher temperature of about 5 degrees F and not fading as other years do. As mentioned before the data is limited and has missing information for 1997. It's interesting to note that in November of 1997 San Francisco had almost 7 inches of rain, while there was 1,43 inches of rain this past November. It's intriguing to wonder if the 5 degree warmer water in 1997 accounts for the higher November rain totals? To pursue this further I will next look at the 1997 Bodega Bay data to see if there is more complete water temperature data!  Update 12/3/15 checking Bodega buoy data finds no useable data for all of 1997 and no data in 1998 until 3/28/98. So no earth shaking revelations here, just an exercise by a concerned citizen to help shake out the speculations from the actual data. Although our local waters are just a small part of the whole system, I wonder if water temperatures locally can be predictors of the El Niño effect.....not sure of that but the elevated temperatures over 2014 and 2015 is surly indications of a planet in distress!