Things that make me happy, 2023

 I've been looking through my "Happy" and "For Later" folders, picking out photos that made me happy in 2023. These are some of them, in no particular order.

Sapling in well-aged log, Oyster Bay, February.

Witches' butter. Or Orange Jelly, depending on the log. December, Tyee Spit.

Dried Sugar Wrack kelp, January, Oyster Bay.

Rocky tide flats, February

A gull, businesslike, going places. December, on Tyee Spit.

All the green on these two snags is lichen. Photo from July of 2022, but it's still making me happy.

Octopus in eelgrass look-alike.

The story behind this photo: my great-grandson, 9, learned that I used to like Lego, so he insisted that his mom had to send me a Lego kit for Christmas. This was the result. She's hanging out in a palm tree because I didn't have kelp on hand.

Coots are among my favourite birds. I don't see them often. December, Tyee Spit.

Part 1. There are more.

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He estado organizando la carpeta llamada "Cosas que me hacen feliz" en la computadora, escogiendo fotos que me hicieron feliz en el año 2023. Estas son algunas, en orden al azahar.

1. Un arbolito de hoja perenne, creciendo sobre un troncón viejo. En Oyster Bay, febrero.
2. El hongo "Mantequilla de Brujas", Tremella mesenterica. O si no, Jalea Anaranjada, Dacrymyces chrysospermus: depende de a cual especie pertenece la madera. Tyee Spit, diciembre.
3. Laminaria saccharina, un kelp "azucarado". Oyster Bay, en enero.
4. Zona intramareal, con rocas. Febrero.
5. Una gaviota, muy en serio, con negocios a que atender. Tyee Spit, diciembre.
6. Todo lo verde en estos dos árboles es puro liquen. La foto es de julio de 2022 en el bosque a las orillas del rio Campbell.
7. Un pulpo Lego, en algo que casi parece hierba marina Zostera sp. Pues, mi gran-nieto, de 9 años, al saber que a mi me gustaba antes construir cosas con Lego, insistió en que su mamá me enviara un juego moderno. Esto fue el resultado. El pulpo se ha subido a una palmera, ya que no encontró quelpo en mi casa.
8. Las fochas americanas, también conocidas como gallaretas o chocas, son uno de mis pájaros favoritos. Los veo raramente. Tyee Spit, en diciembre.

Esto fue la primera lista. Hay más.

Designs in blue and grey

 I liked the pattern that sea foam made on waves coming ashore over smooth, flat sand.

Attenuated waves

Further down the beach, with rocks making a breakwater, the only waves are sand waves.

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Me gustaron los diseños que hizo la espuma de mar en las olas que se quiebran en una playa arenosa lisa y plana.

Fotos: Las olas, que se disminuyen mientras avanzan. Y, más adelante en la misma playa, las rocas forman un rompeolas y las únicas olas son las de la arena.

Wavy beach

Tide coming in over Miracle Beach

Sand waves, water waves

Miracle Beach is wide and flat. On a calm day, the tide rolls in quickly in a series of low, long waves. And the sand has its own waves, closer together, sharper, and strangely, at a different angle from the ocean waves that carved them.

Palest blues

Oyster Bay at mid tide.

From the new tip of the sandbar, looking east over the tide flats to the breakwater. Mitlenatch Island in the background, at mid-Strait.

Incoming tides swirl around counter-clockwise, then reverse when they cross the inner leg of the bar, making these wavy indentations in the sandbar.

As the tide comes in

I returned to the new stretch of beach I'd found. The tide was coming in, and on this flat beach, it was in a hurry. I watched as the water reached pinkish blobs, which immediately opened up to become anemones.  Tiny sleeping snails turned out to be mainly scurrying hermit crab youngsters.

Random shot of the base rock, with stones and "snails".

... which became hermit crabs. Here's one, under the first inch of water.

Mini-hermie. With palm ridges for size comparison.

Much of the shoreline here is covered with a short, hard, almost black seaweed. Black, that is, while it is dry. I stood on a stone to watch what happened when the first waves reached it.

Turkish washcloth, dry and stiff. There's a slight purplish tinge to it in direct sunlight.

The water rolled in. In a moment, the colour had changed from black to purple to a deep red wine colour.

Third wave on a tiny scrap of washcloth.

Second wave. The top parts of the seaweed have only been underwater for seconds.

I hadn't been paying attention; the water had reached my shoes, supposedly planted on a higher stone, and was threatening to pour into the tops. I hopped, skipped, splashed back to dry beach, and went to examine the upper tide level instead.

And nary a crab

At the end of the road, where the Bella Coola river meets the ocean, I went to explore the tide flats, to discover what lives there.

The river is that thin line to the right, the inlet is on the left.

No two intertidal zones are alike. This one, though it is river meeting ocean, like the beaches I know on the lower mainland, is unlike any other I have visited. For one thing, though I turned over stones and logs, parted underwater grasses, I saw no snails, no crabs, no worm piles. And no eelgrass.

The river is glacier run-off, silty and cold. And Bentinck Inlet is long, narrow, and deep; though the tide runs up to the base of the hills, the river also runs far out to sea. The salinity is low. The currents are strong. The grasses on the tide flats are land-based grasses, not eelgrass. The only seaweeds are those the tide ripped up and dragged in; they don't live there.

This whole area is covered by the tide. Plants growing here are moderately salt-tolerant.

Besides several varieties of tough grasses, I found silverweed, blue sailor, and yellow gumweed, all in the area that is covered by salty water twice daily.

The tide rushing in, laying the grasses flat.

Rockweed tossed on top of the flattened grasses. A few leaves of silverweed poke through the grass.

Deep in the channel, where the water is heavier and saltier, there are crabs and anemones, sea cucumbers and starfish, all out of reach without diving gear. The tide flats are home to plants, birds, and flies, come to feed on dead salmon. And if I'd been carrying a shovel, maybe I'd have found worms.