September 21, 2008

Report Details

Despite the mild weekend weather, we did not see much human activity during our walk, except at the beach access directly off Yachats Ocean Road. There was a house being remodelled at the north end of the mile, close to the bluff, but with no impact to the rocky shoreline that we could see. There was still a fair amount of water seepage from the bluffs in many places, despite recent dry weather. Gender Creek was down to a trickle, though. This mile observation was noteable for the amount of bird activity we saw. There were surfbirds, numbers of kildeer foraging at waterline by Yachats Ocean Road, many cormorants, scoters, oystercatchers, a long-legged sandpiper-like bird we could not identify, and dozens of pelicans mostly flying south, skimming the waves. There were large numbers of gulls, particularly just south of Yachats Ocean Road on the rocky shore and at the south end of the mile on a rocky point not publicly accessible. We noted the usual large colonies of mussels, and acorn and goose-neck barnacles, at waterline along the whole mile. There were also numerous ochre seastars, although they appeared to be more prevalent at the north end of the mile than at the south end. We saw a few sea lions sunning themselves on the rocks, but fewer than we have seen previously. We were pleased to observe that there was virtually no debris of any origin along the whole mile. This was a great improvement from a couple of years ago at this time, when there was a significant amount of debris of all kinds.