July 17, 2022

Report Details

Today, we observed a whopping total of 1,059 Ochre sea stars (Pisaster ochraceus) at the northern rocky outcroppings exposed by the low tides at Silver Point. We had 8 team members participate for 1.63 hours for a total survey effort of 13 hours. These efforts involved visually inspecting the stars for signs of sea star wasting syndrome (SSWS) as part of our observational study. A total of 1,001 stars were healthy (94.5%), 40 had one white lesion on the ray or central disk (mild SSWS; 3.8%), while 18 individuals had more than one lesion, arm curling, body disintegration, or organs emerging from body cavity (severe SSWS; 1.7%). We sent images to MARINe who confirmed our correct designations of mild vs. severe disease category symptoms. Size class measurements ranged from the minute 10mm to a dinner plate sized 240mm, measured from the center of the central disk to the longest ray. No stars were touched in this observation (visual inspection only). Of the 1,001 healthy individuals counted, 837 ndividuals measured between 50-140mm in terms of size class designations, which is 83.4% of all healthy Pisaster measured. Many juvenile stars were observed, especially in the crevices of California mussels along the rock wall of Silver Point rock. Additional tide pool invertebrates seen included a stiff-footed sea cucumber, tar-spot sea cucumber, Hind’s chiton, Lined chiton, Hairy chiton (upon visual inspection, it looked like someone pried this chiton off the rocks), Frilled commensal scaleworm on an ochre sea star, Rockweed isopod, Pacific rock crab, California mussels (thousands!), and an interesting coralline algae in the genus Bossiella.