We went wading in the ocean at Venice today. There was some kind of muck in the ocean. It looked like someone had taken buckets of fluorescent green paint and dumped them just offshore.
I’d ask what it was, but I’m not sure I want to know.
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Probably was florescent green paint. ‘Cause the only colors alge comes in besides green is red, blue-green, and brown.
Alan Kellogg (f27b4b) — 8/4/2007 @ 11:50 pmPat,
Was it green foam? It’s always present at El Porto, the surfing beach just south of the Scattergood and Hyperion plants. Pay it no mind. The water at LA beaches ain’t fantastic, but there’s really nothing to be concerned about. I’m out there numerous times a month and I’ve seen no effect on my healthy, for better or worse.
If you’re looking for a slightly cleaner beach let me make a couple recommendations:
1) Zuma beach just past Kanan Dune Road on the PCH. Free parking off the PCH and great water quality. Very easy access to Starbucks as well.
2) San Onofre, just south of the nuclear power plants. The beach is accessible from an awesome campground, so it’s a fun weekend trip all around. You can even round it out with a trip to the Rainbow Sandals factory.
3) Back To The Beach Cafe, just north of the Santa Monica pier. This beach borders the ritzy Jonathan Club which is directly opposite the California Incline on the PCH. Lovely beach, expensive parking.
But, again, pay the green foam no mind. The best indicator of water quality at our beaches would be the presence of sealife. Grab some goggle and swim out a wee bit past the shore break. The fish populations in that area have SKYROCKETED since I was a kid. The only problem with that fact is that the jellyfish populations have risen also. Keep your eyes open. 😉
H2U (338ff2) — 8/5/2007 @ 8:02 amHow close to the commercial shipping lanes were you?
Dumping bilge water or dumping other things (up to and including flourescent green paint), and leaving oily and tarry gook to float onshore, seems to be a habit of freighters approaching/leaving port. what you saw may have just been ordinary greasy oil scum floating on the water. I doubt it’s toxic, but I certainly wouldn’t want to go back there any time soon, and I wouldn’t be too keen on snorkeling there to find out what the sealife is like.
Generally, the further the beach is from normal shipping channels, the cleaner it is.
kishnevi (67c9d4) — 8/5/2007 @ 10:04 amWell, the water off the Gateway National Seashore was warm and beautiful yesterday. 🙂 My darling bride and I stayed until almost 6:00 PM.
Dana (c36902) — 8/5/2007 @ 3:13 pmVenice beach is FAR, FAR from any normal shipping lanes. The only vessels that would be pumping bilges in that area are either commercial fishermen, or private yachts – and if they got caught, they would pay an horrendous fine.
Another Drew (8018ee) — 8/5/2007 @ 7:18 pmOne thing we forget, especially with oil residue, is that the bottom of the ocean all along the coast is fractured and seeps oil thanks to Mother Nature – frequently found as small black tar globules in the water or on the beach itself.
You just got back from Maui, which has some of the greatest beaches in the world. What the hell are you doing going to Venice, which is disgusting on its best day.
Lou Parise (c1033e) — 8/5/2007 @ 10:52 pmIf it was day-glo green, it could be Florazine dye, a non-toxic green dye that is used to look for leaks in pipes/tanks/and the like. Turns water bright green then biodegrades after a day or too.
Teche (c003f1) — 8/6/2007 @ 8:39 amSorry, that should be “Fluorescein” dye.
Teche (c003f1) — 8/6/2007 @ 8:41 amFletch reference duly noted.
the wolf (3f20ac) — 8/6/2007 @ 9:00 amAnother Drew (in 5) I know nothing about the local geography or thalassography, but if the winds and currents are right, what a freighter dumps at sea could easily end up on a beach that seems to be fairly distant from normal shipping lanes. I wasn’t, however, aware of the seeping oil you mention. Where I live, tbe most popular beaches are literally next to the main shipping channels (Port Everglades Inlet is the south end of Fort Lauderdale beach, and Dodge Island lies off Miami Beach’s South Pointe Park) and freighters are normally waiting off shore for their turn to enter port, extremely visible to anyone who is beachifying themselves up and down the length of both Fort Lauderdale and Miami Beach. Hence, tar globs are often abundant, and their source is easily recognized.
kishnevi (6161c5) — 8/6/2007 @ 6:43 pmAre you sure the fluorescence was from the muck? There is naturally bioluminescent algae called sea sparkle, and few other natural sources. I’d need more detail to figure it out.
OmegaPaladin (b92d2c) — 8/7/2007 @ 2:03 amYou must not live around here. That green stuff is a recurring phenomenon called (phytoplankton, microscopic fish, green shit) and won’t hurt you. I have heard of paranoids being bitten by the little things. This stuff sometimes is so thick that bait fish cannot get oxygen but that is the only damage it does.
Howard Veit (4ba8d4) — 8/7/2007 @ 5:53 amOh, not Venice, Italy. Never mind.
andycanuck (e17469) — 8/7/2007 @ 8:27 amkishnevi..
Another Drew (8018ee) — 8/7/2007 @ 7:09 pmThe ports of LA/LB are about 30 miles south of Venice. Ships departing from there will go due south from the breakwater about 3-5 miles and then turn to the west. If going up the coast to SF or Seattle or Alaska, they will not turn north for about 100 miles or more (they’ll want to be able to clear Point Conception and stay to the outside of the Channel Islands too). I doubt that residents of Venice or Santa Monica ever see a commercial vessel. It’s not like the ports in South Florida, which are in the heart of the cities (please check Goggle Maps, or your handy atlas).
addendum…
Another Drew (8018ee) — 8/7/2007 @ 7:27 pmThere is one point of major shipping in the Venice area: Off of El Segundo, south of LAX(5-10 miles from Venice Beach) is an off-shore oil tanker terminal for the Chevron refinery at El Segundo. It is also an area heavily travelled by private vessels. I am quite confident that any bilge pumping by these tankers would be observed and reported to the Coast Guard and other agencies.
Ever since the Santa Barbara Channel oil spill ( from an offshore platform, not a tanker) the oil industry has been under tremendous scrutiny. The last thing the industry wants is to be caught in a violation of this type, and it is the one thing the enviro groups want to catch the industry doing.