What were Monterey conditions like 10-15 years ago?

[reefvagabond]

Does anyone here know what normal Monterey/Carmel conditions were like 10-15 years ago?

The reason I bring it up is because at a recent reef check event it was mentioned that the stormy conditions of the last year and a half might actually be the norm, where as the lull of the 4-5 years before that might have been an anomaly.

So I'm looking for some historical perspective, jut out of curiosity.

 

[MaxBottomtime]

This is not the norm. The past couple of winters have been horrible along the West Coast, from California to Alaska. Weekends have been blown out, waves have kept us home and a lot of the marine life disappeared. It is showing a slow comeback in some areas but we haven't seen jellies in our area in three years. We used to find them offshore all year.

 

[3D diver]

The drought and this winter were unusual.

I remember more kelp, lots of sunflower stars, lots of shrimp along the breakwater wall, and the brittle stars hid under rocks. There was less sand by the breakwater, so the admiralty anchor was exposed, though that did vary year-to-year.

Parking was worse at the BW, so I often had to park in the top lot and walk down with my gear on.

 

[JellyMan777]

True, the weather has been more violent over the past couple of years, but that cycle waxes and wanes normally. Since the turn of the millennium have seen extended periods of both heavy and light storm activity.

The real difference that you see right now is the fallout from the starfish wasting disease. Without predators, the urchin population has exploded and is decimating the kelp forests. The decrease in the kelp population has a cascade effect on those species that rely upon its presence. The net result is a partial collapse of the kelp forest ecosystem in many regions. No kelp = low invertebrate populations = low food supply for predators. You can easily see that the effects of the wasting disease are felt all the way up the food chain.

The big question right now is how long until we see a recovery of the star/kelp populations? Will they ever recover given the myriad environmental pressures (global warming, etc)? If you find answers to these questions, please let me know. I've been looking for this information for a long time and nobody seems to know.

 

[MaxBottomtime]

Sea stars have begun returning to SoCal this year. I have even found juvenile sunflower stars, although I haven't seen an adult since the last wasting period.

 

[Bigbella]

As a Central Coast (Santa Cruz) native, I have found that the recent 2016-17 storms were actually quite typical of my experiences there, going back over thirty-eight years of diving.

Diving was typically the best during late Fall into Winter, barring storms when the waters were too cold for plankton blooms. Northwest winds arrive in Spring; and with it, the often windy afternoon conditions we are currently experiencing.

As far as the recent sea star wasting disease (attributable to something related to parvovirus to bacterial in origin, depending upon the varying hand-wringing opinions), I have seen a recent comeback from previous years, especially since 2015. Sunstars, though, are few and far between; though they have been reported in deeper waters, almost sub-tidally in some areas off Big Sur.

Urchin populations also come and go; and I have seen far greater prolifations in the Monterey Bay in years past; and there have been greater barrens than, say, th one currently off Coral Street. That too will change; succession of one form, or another will set in, as it always has.

The kelp population has historically waxed and waned with the seasons; and even in more calm years, hundreds of tons are regularly washed up along the coast, just from mechanical, typical wave-related activities; and you cannot drive north on HWY-1 without being assaulted by ithe stench near Swanton and Greyhound Rock.

By mid-Summer, the canopy with be thick as ever. We regularly collect some for sampling purposes; and it is far healthier, more consistent, in our colder waters, than any in SoCal . . .

 

[JellyMan777]

@Bigbella – From your last statement, it sounds like you are involved in academic research to some extent. Can you comment on the status of the wasting disease? Are we through it? Is it still in effect?

A recent ReefCheck article painted a none-to-rosy picture of the status of our kelp forests (Reef Check - California's Kelp Forests Undergoing Massive Changes). Based on their transect data, we still haven't seen an appreciable recovery in either kelp or star populations (see figures 1 and 2). In fact, it still looks as if we are at the near bottom of the recovery. Hopefully, the 2017 data will be more encouraging.

My personal experience does agree somewhat with your observations. I did run across three juvenile sunstars at McAbee beach last September, but I haven't seen any since. On the upside, both bat and ochre stars seem to have made a comeback and I now see them regularly. Meanwhile, I've seen areas normally covered in kelp now converted to urchin barrens (for example, shale/tanker reef now has almost no kelp where it was once covered -- nothing but urchins there now).

I have a genuine interest in this phenomenon. The dynamics of the disease impact upon the marine ecosystem is really fascinating. I grew up in Colorado, where forest fires play a critical role in the revitalization of certain ecosystems (i.e. fires return nutrient matter to the soil, clearing a path for aspen forests, which then provide a foothold for pines). I can't help but wonder whether the wasting disease serves somewhat of the same purpose as the fire. Perhaps it clears the way for new growth as part of some macrocycle?

Thanks.

 

[dbnewton]

My memory of Monterey from the early 80's was of extensive summer kelp forests, so thick only a fool would try to surface swim through them. Fall storms typically tore them up and they regrow each year. It was a rare weekend when we could not dive anywhere there due to weather, but you had to be flexible and go where the seas permitted.

Start fish and Urchins were abundant but not overpopulated. Abalone were nearly extinct. Otters and Sea Lions plentiful and always curious. Reefs were alive and colorful with soft corals. anemone, and fish.

Visibility and sea conditions varied vastly but there were nearly always swells you could ride sometimes as deep as 40 feet. The visibility rarely exceeded 25 feet but on those rare beautiful days when vis was >50 feet and the sun shined down through the kelp canopy it was absolutely spectacular.

There were always abundant game fish, the largest being Ling Cod or Halibut, but Cabazon were a tasty favorite. Huge rock scallops were quite common for the well trained eye.

Thanks for bringing forth these good memories.

 

[Bigbella]

@JellyMan777:

For a start, I don't put much stock in Reef Check, with their cadre of volunteer "researchers" -- many of whom have no scientific background whatsoever, and are often a bunch of neophytes and overly-gear-laden enthusiasts; or else pothead surfers, one of whom was convinced that an errant elephant seal, some years back, on the Monterey Breakwater's launch ramp, was a walrus.

On another occasion last Fall, I had an encounter with members (I won't even mention a previous guy who was ensnared by his own spool of measuring tape), who was quite alarmed that the ends of the sporophyll blades (the reproductive fronds near the holdfast) appeared ragged to him; and he immediately ascribed it to pollution and / or climate change.

I had to explain to him and his gullible partner (attending UCSC, no less, in environmental studies -- wow) that that was the norm; that Macrocystis reproduces in that manner; that spores are sloughed off the distal portions of the blades. Nevermind the hundreds of juvenile "plants" that I saw on that particular dive.

The sporophylls are frequently used for pollution tests in bioassay laboratories; think of the spores as canaries in a coalmine; and I can attest that they are healthy and that any number of labs insist upon those from Monterey and Carmel Bay, year round, for their dredge studies, what have you.

Since New Years, I have seen juvenile sunstars off Asilomar; at the Pinnacles; and off Big Creek, below 30 meters. I haven't seen further evidence of the wasting disease since 2015 or so. It may coincide with extreme El Niño events from time to time.

Populations shift and change; are subject to succession; that's their nature, regardless of whether we are involved. An old client required a particular species of sea star, for embryological studies some years back; and I hadn't seen any. When I inquired, she assured me that they were common in the local intertidal; and the researcher's sole source of information was a 1947 edition of Ricketts and Calvin's Between Pacific Tides -- itself originally published the year Hitler invaded Poland.

Doesn't anyone else think that the natural world is any less subject to change than the realm of geopolitics?

 

[gypsyjim]

My memory of Monterey from the early 80's was of extensive summer kelp forests, so thick only a fool would try to surface swim through them. Fall storms typically tore them up and they regrow each year. It was a rare weekend when we could not dive anywhere there due to weather, but you had to be flexible and go where the seas permitted.

Start fish and Urchins were abundant but not overpopulated. Abalone were nearly extinct. Otters and Sea Lions plentiful and always curious. Reefs were alive and colorful with soft corals. anemone, and fish.

Visibility and sea conditions varied vastly but there were nearly always swells you could ride sometimes as deep as 40 feet. The visibility rarely exceeded 25 feet but on those rare beautiful days when vis was >50 feet and the sun shined down through the kelp canopy it was absolutely spectacular.

There were always abundant game fish, the largest being Ling Cod or Halibut, but Cabazon were a tasty favorite. Huge rock scallops were quite common for the well trained eye.

Thanks for bringing forth these good memories.

I only dived Monterey Bay with you that one weekend back in the 80's, but my memories of the Kelp Forest there are still vivid today.
That, and the seal zipping in, kissing "my mask" and disappearing, leaving my heart beating a bit faster.