Waves Rumble Ashore at Wellfleet’s Newcomb Hollow Ocean Beach
Late February and early March storms battered Outer Cape Cod causing substantial waterfront erosion on both ocean and bay sides. Under bright sunshine on Saturday, the remnants of these storms still endured with breakers crashing along the nearly 30 mile Great Back Beach. Enormous gouges have been ripped out of the towering Atlantic coastal sand banks.
Scalloped Erosion at South Terminus of Indian Neck Sea Wall
On the bayside, erosion has been equally destructive. At the south edge of the Indian Neck sea wall, ”scalloping” has cut deeply into the bank and now threatens the wooden stairway. Despite supposedly protective tidal fencing, trees have been ripped from the bank by the erosive force of winter storms and flood tides.
Continuous Winter Overwash Transforms Indian Neck Salt Marsh
Nearby, this winter’s continuous overwash of the foredune along Indian Neck’s Blackfish Creek shore has transformed the salt marsh habitat previously protected behind it.
Repeated storms and flood tides soften and threaten the extremely productive terrapin nesting sites along Marsh Road on Lieutenant Island’s south shore. Tidal wrack has been strewn along the roadway and into abutting yards. Turtle Journal has not previously seen such erosion in the last dozen years.
Erosion of Lieutenant Island’s Meadow Avenue West
Tides similarly assaulted the roadway connecting the first (east) and second (west) islands with significant erosion and softening.
Four Additional Pilot Whale Skeletons Exposed by Tidal Erosion
On the west shore of Lieutenant Island, four more pilot whale skeletons have extruded from the sand with winter battering. See the earlier Turtle Journal posting, Whale Bones Rise from Sands of History, from late January 2010.
Outer Cape weather has been rugged this whole week. Wind-driven, non-stop snow/sleet/drizzle mix pelted the Cape with little accumulation as temperatures hovered around freezing, day and night. Massive wind-assisted tides tossed wrack high into the dunes and flooded bayside roads. This workman tried to escape Lieutenant Island late Thursday afternoon, but got trapped between the causeway (right) and mainland road (left) as high tide violently gushed into the South Wellfleet marsh.
Flooded Lieutenant Island Bridge
Unwilling to wait the two hours it would take for the tide to recede, the workman decided to brave the flooded roadway and drive his pickup through the high salt water.
Autocide!
The scene reminded me of the favorite summer past time of the South Wellfleet ”tidefolk.” As the tide rises, they go down to the Lieutenant Island Bridge and cheer the tourists as they commit autocide. Nothing compares with watching a Mercedes SUV in a natural salt water car wash.
Small 4-Foot Dolphin Carcass on Indian Neck
Continuing the bad day spell on Thursday, Turtle Journal discovered the carcass of a small, four-foot dolphin on Indian Neck. This specimen had been thrust high into the marsh by storm-driven high tides. We quickly alerted the Cape Cod Mammal Stranding Network at IFAW (hotline # 508-743-9548), and we sent them digital images via cell phone.
Scavenged Dolphin Carcass off Blackfish Creek
The dolphin washed ashore at the mouth of Blackfish Creek at the southern edge of the Indian Neck sea wall. Predators had scavenged the carcass while it lay on the beach.
Six pilot whales rise from the sands of history, uncovered by scouring storms that battered Outer Cape Cod in December and January. In a rare moment in time revealed by the natural forces that continue to shape our world today, we capture an epic scene from long ago, frozen in the very sands that are Cape Cod.
Long-Finned Pilot Whale Skeleton Emerges
As we patroled the west beach of Lieutenant Island in Wellfleet, Turtle Journal came across still articulated skeletons of long-finned pilot whales rising from the sands of what had formerly been an ancient salt marsh, now succumbed to the forces of nature and transformed to a barrier beach.
Pilot Whales Rise from Sands of History
Imagine … as one hundred, or perhaps two hundred or more years ago, a pod of pilot whales chased bait fish into a flooded salt marsh on the western edge of Horse Island, now Lieutenant Island, in Wellfleet Bay. Maybe on a day like Monday with gale winds howling from the southwest pushing flood water into the bay, the whales swam high into the marsh where they became unexpectedly trapped and stranded when the ebb tide dropped suddenly beneath them, leaving the animals stuck in the ooze marshlands.
1893 Map of Wellfleet Bay
In those historic days, stranded pilot whales offered survival and a little prosperty to Outer Cape residents scratching a hard living in a harsh and unforgiving environment. The nearby estuary is named Blackfish Creek in honor of pilot whales, also known as blackfish, that stranded in the hundreds and sustained Cape Codders during the toughest of times. For more information on pilot whale strandings, see Discovery of Historic Pilot Whale Bones Hints at Cape Cod’s Past.
Four Articulated Pilot Whale Skeletons “in Formation”
The exposed bones on Lieutenant Island revealed four still largely articulated pilot whales lying two by two at the northern edge of the beach.
Two More Pilot Whale Skeletons Begin to Emerge
About 100 feet behind this formation of four, two more pilot whales were just beginning to emerge from the moist sands.
DO NOT DISTURB!
Alive, dead or skeletons, pilot whales are as precious to us today as they were to our Cape ancestors, albeit for different reasons. Marine mammals are protected under federal law and regulations. They may be observed and enjoyed without disturbance.
HOT OFF THE PRESSES
CapeCast, the on-line broadcast of the Cape Cod Times, reports on this discovery today, January 26th, 2010.
The Stranding Weekend field adventure offered by Mass Audubon’s Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary in mid November is clearly a hands-on, participatory event. As a gentle fall lingered into the Ides of November, there were concerns that the pre-planned Stranding Weekend would prove nothing more than “a walk on the beach.”
Breakers Roll into Scusset Beach in Bourne
Thanks to Mother Nature, Hurricane Ida, then tropical storm and finally powerful nor’easter pounded Cape Cod with driving rain and gale force winds blowing directly from the North Atlantic. While water and air temperatures remained a tad too high to induce cold-stunned sea turtle strandings, the Cape presented a variety of marine species to observe, especially during and immediately after a nor’easter.
After a wonderful candlelight dinner in the Wellfleet Bay Nature Center Friday evening, participants endured a brief stranding introduction by weekend leaders, Bob Prescott (sanctuary director), Dennis Murley (senior naturalist), Sue Wieber Nourse (marine scientist and master educator) and Don Lewis (Turtle Guy). Everyone bundled into layers upon layers of hopefully waterproof clothing, adjusted headlamps and flashlights, loaded into the Mass Audubon van and the Turtle Journal Element and headed to Chapin Beach in Dennis in search for stranded creatures at the nighttime high tide.
Sandy Neck Teams
Led by Dennis Murley (center) & Sue Wieber Nourse (right)
Bright and early Saturday morning, participants geared up again. Two teams led by Dennis Murley and Sue Wieber Nourse climbed in the van to head to the Sandy Neck barrier beach in West Barnstable. With winds blowing from the east northeast, stranded animals were more likely to be found on beaches at the west end of Cape Cod.
Chipman’s Cove Team Discovers Quarter Ton Ocean Sunfish
Another team under Don Lewis patrolled Scusset Beach on the other side of Cape Cod Canal in Bourne, then hit Campground Beach in Eastham to confirm the stranding of a juvenile torpedo ray and finally visited Chipman’s Cove in Wellfleet to document a freshly stranded male ocean sunfish.
Examination of Male Ocean Sunfish at Chipman’s Cove
After teams reassembled at the Sanctuary for a great lunch, it was time to saddle up and put our backs into the enormous channel of moving the quarter ton, male ocean sunfish from the beach at Chipman’s Cove to the Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary for a scientific necropsy. You may recall that the scientific name for ocean sunfish (Mola mola) is derived from the Latin word for millstone. Perhaps that gives you some idea of the challenge ahead.
Nothing creates comraderie more solidly than a backbreaking team build … and moving a quarter ton deadweight more than qualifies as a backbreaking exercise. You sign up for hands-on experience; you get hands-on experience!
Measuring Length of Male Ocean Sunfish
Back at the sanctuary with the Mola mola intact, participants began the process of taking detailed measurements. Krill Carson of NEBShark joined the leadership team on Saturday for a scientific necropsy of the ocean sunfish.
Measuring Dorsal Fin of Male Ocean Sunfish
Once external measurements were completed, a detailed necropsy commenced to scientifically document the anatomy of the Mola mola species and to collect certain tissue samples for further analysis. During the autopsy, we determined that this animal was a male.
Juvenile Female Kemp’s Ridley Sea Turtle
The next morning began with a necropsy of a juvenile Kemp’s ridley sea turtle that had stranded on Sandy Neck beach the previous weekend.
Bob Prescott Prepares Necropsy of Female Kemp’s Ridley
Despite a large, well-healed probable shark bite in its lower right quadrant, this specimen was assessed to have been in rather healthy condition prior to getting trapped and cold-stunned in Cape Cod Bay. Based on the autopsy, the gender of this animal was determined to have been female.
Necropsy completed, participants headed to the Town Pier to board the Naviator for a two hour cruise of Wellfleet Bay. The destination would be Jeremy Point and Billingsgate Shoals at the southern end of the Great Island peninsula. The calm after the storm (Hurrican Ida) brought a thick fog that lay like a comforting blanket over the seascape. Shorebirds, driven by gale winds to seek shelter in Wellfleet Bay, filled the harbor. About a half mile west of Indian Neck, we encountered a bull pilot whale … a rare sighting from the Naviator. Mass pilot whale stranding have occurred with such frequency in Wellfleet that one of its principal estuaries is named Blackfish Creek after the species.
Curious Gray and Harbor Seals Lounge on Sandbar
On a sandbar off Jeremy Point, we ran into a large gathering of gray and harbor seals, many of whom were as curious about us as we were about them.
Turtle Journal visited Chipman’s Cove in Wellfleet on Outer Cape Cod this morning. Parking at the end of Old Pier Road, we found a fairly fresh ocean sunfish carcass about 25 feet to the right/north of the Town Landing.
Ocean Sunfish Snout, Mouth, Eye, Gills and Pectoral Fin
Using Don’s sneakers as a gross ruler, this sunfish measured ~ 5 feet long and ~ 6 feet wide/high.
Seven Foot Ocean Sunfish in Chipman’s Cove
Fifty feet to the left/south of the Old Pier Town Landing, we discovered a rapidly decomposing ocean sunfish. Gross measurements yielded a length of ~ 7 feet and a width/height of 7.5 feet.
The video documents the two ocean sunfish Turtle Journal discovered in Wellfleet’s Chipman’s Cove today.
Partially Necropsied Ocean Sunfish on Lieutenant Island
Our next stop was the west shore of Lieutenant Island to check out a reported ocean sunfish that had stranded last weekend. This specimen had been partially necropsied to ascertain its gender … before an astronomic 12-foot tide could strand the team on the island.
Pilot Whale Bones Emerge from Old Salt Marsh
About 100 yards north of the stranded sunfish, winter tides have eroded the beach on the west shore of Lieutenant Island, once again exposing pilot whale bones from the peet of a long dead salt marsh. Last year we found four pilot whale skeletons in this area before summer sands raised the beach level above this burial site. See Discovery of Historic Pilot Whale Bones Hints at Cape Cod’s Past.
Exposed Pilot Whale Bones on Lieutenant Island
With giant ocean sunfish and pilot whales, Turtle Journal had a BIG day this Thursday.
Yet, there was still more to come. CapeCast, the broadcast vehicle of the Cape Cod Times, published a delightfully hilarious and informative video on the large ocean sunfish that Turtle Journal discovered this weeked at Corporation Beach in Dennis. See Ocean Sunfish Strandings Continue on Cape Cod.
Click here or on the picture above to watch the CapeCast video … and ENJOY!
