Final trestle counts from a new direction and bubble making

West end of the trestle and Tommy Thompson Trail.

     Thursday found Dr. Dinnel, Dickson, a few other volunteers and myself at the opposite end of the trestle on the west side of Padilla Bay. 

     The end of the trestle site where we sampled runs along rocks after the end of the pilings, apparently the rocks were actually just placed over the existing pilings so they are still there leachig creosote into the bay.   We sampled both substrate and Olympia oysters as we have been  on the other end of the trestle using the same tools and procedures.  Instead of our usual sample pattern we sampled in the zone between the total mud and the rocky shore.  One group of three sampled either side of the trail from the end of the pilings every twenty feet for approximately 2000 feet.

Our side of the trail for sampling.

The quadrat, pole and bucket of science.

     Because we only took one sample in each location down the length of the trail it went much more quickly.  Also there was often less substrate though in some areas there were living Pacific oysters of amazing size.  Dr. Dinnel said they are probably 12-15 year old.  Just one would make a whole pot of oyster bisque!  I wouldn't eat them from this bay even though on the surface the west end looked less polluted than the east end.  The native Olympia oysters are fighters though, we often found them settled on living Pacific oysters.

Intrepid volunteers.

Dickson said my mom needed a good picture.

     In the evening it was time for discover scuba at the local pool with Nate Schwarck the dive safety officer at Shannon Point, and boat captain and and...... Even those with certification jumped at the chance to dive even if it was at the public pool.  We were pretty evenly split between certified divers and brand new folks who participated in discover scuba.  Those of us who are already certified buddied up and did skill review and had a blast.  I partnered with Umi and it was nice to go back over all those skills that you don't necessarily practice after you get your certification.  e even went as far as to remove all gear on the bottom, swim to the surface at pool side then free swim back down and replace all of our gear.  It was a joy to see all the smiling faces of the new divers, Kalia especially seemed to enjoy herself.   After three hours split between swimming, playing on the awesome water slide and scuba diving we were all exhausted and hit our beds shortly after returning to Shannon Point around 11.  This was the first time I utilized getting my WWU certification to drive the passenger vans and it was good to be able to help.  I was so excited I forgot my camera and am bummed about that, then the other waterproof camera stopped working so there aren't many pictures of the evening.  Anacortes has a really nice public pool by the way.