There was a boat stranded in the sand, at Smelt Bay, on Saturday. The Woody Point’s anchor lay not too far distant, a testament to its owner’s original intention. The ocean was perhaps another hundred feet distant. 

CKTZ News came to take pictures for another story. Thousands of mussels died on the exposed rocks at the southern side of the beach. They were presumably casualties of the heatwave that ravaged shellfish populations throughout the West Coast almost two weeks ago. 

‘Hottest days we’ve ever had …’

“We had some of the hottest days we’ve ever had and it happened on days with very, very low tides,” explained Dr Chris Harley, a marine biologist with the University of British Columbia. 

Temperatures have since fallen to a more comfortable level. A high of 28°C, instead of the 35°C -40°C recorded at the Cortes Island School during the five days of the recent heat wave. 

Low tide wasn’t quite as low on Saturday either: 2 feet above the baseline, as opposed to 0 or even -0.3. 

The Woody Point

Daryl, owner of the Woody Point, said that his charts indicated there should have been more water. 

He was a little embarrassed, but his boat was not damaged. If he had known this was going to happen, Daryl said he would have brought some new zinc strips to replace the used ones on his hull. Of course: if he suspected this could happen, it probably wouldn’t have.

Instead, he spent a day on the beach. 

The tide returned after 4 PM in the afternoon and Daryl sailed home to Powell River.  

Stranded in the heat

At least 719 British Columbians perished in the recent heat wave. There were 97 on Vancouver Island, two to three times the normal death rate. Most of them were older and living alone. Many waited for hours, as BC’s overtaxed ambulance service struggled to respond to calls. 

Dr Harley estimated that a billion marine creatures were stranded in the heat and died. This number is based on a calculation of the mussel population. There were survivors in wet spots, under seaweed, or the shade. Those in exposed places, like the rocks on the south side of Smelt Bay, perished. 

He also emailed that the ‘snails’ you see in the photograph below, ” … are apparently pretty tough – I’ve seen them on other beaches where other species didn’t make it through the heat wave. One of them in the upper-middle part of the photo has glued itself on edge to a mussel shell with a little blob of mucus. They do that so that as little as possible touches a hot surface, which keeps them cooler.”

Cortes Island biologist Sabina Leader Mense wrote that there used to be blue mussels lining the entrance to Mansons Lagoon. They cooked in their shells during a very hot summer afternoon about 1998, when the tide was out. There aren’t any mussels in the lagoon anymore.    

Max Thaysen, Acting Executive Director of the Friends of Cortes Island, emailed that most of the once abundant sand dollar population perished in the recent heat wave. 

“There were lots of dead cockles and oysters outside the lagoon,” he emailed. “ … I’ve received more reports of widespread oyster death around the Gorge.”  

Bruce Ellingsen wrote that he found about 100 dead juvenile Dungeness Crabs stranded in the heat of the sand flats, north of Smelt Bay. Most appeared to be trying to get out of the sand. One was about 1 1/2 feet from its dugout when it perished in the extreme heat. 

There are still baby crabs in the tidal pools left at Smelt Bay, as the ocean recedes, but they seem much fewer in number.

Dr Harley said that as heat waves become common, many marine species will be forced to move further north. 

This could be problematic in Campbell River or the Discovery Islands because the water is already warmer than the outer coast of Oregon, Washington or even the West Coast of Vancouver Island. You have to go to Southern California or Mexico to find replacements. 

“It is unlikely that those species are going to swim here, or drift here as larvae, so we don’t have the species replacements,” he explained.

Top photo credit: The Woody Point left stranded on the beach at Smelt Bay, Cortes Island. Photo by Roy L Hales

Links of Interest:

• (Cortes Currents) Abnormally high number of shellfish deaths on Cortes Island
• (Cortes Currents) A billion marine creatures may have perished in the heat
• (Cortes Currents) articles about, or mentioning, Die offs

Sign-up for Cortes Currents email-out:

To receive an emailed catalogue of articles on Cortes Currents, send a (blank) email to subscribe to your desired frequency:

• Daily, (articles posted during the last 24 hours) – cortescurrents-daily+subscribe@cortes.groups.io
• Weekly Digest cortescurrents – cortescurrents-weekly+subscribe@cortes.groups.io