Star of the Sea
Spending time in nature always helps me feel connected with the place I live. And typically, that bond is shaped through photography — the simple act of exploring with a camera and being curious about what I see. I’m not an expert in any of it, but, there are some habitats where I find myself particularly out of my depth. Among the most mysterious to me are our shifting intertidal zones.
Recently, I read Life Between the Tides, Adam Nicolson’s deeply immersive meditation on these places. He describes life in rock pools as tough, with wildly fluctuating temperatures and salinity, but the book is as philosophical as it is scientific, and it left me with a new sense of wonder. I realized I’d been sleeping on the opportunity to glimpse the unfamiliar marine life that gather in basins of seawater along the shore. It was time to go tide pooling.
After some brief research, I learned that Duxbury Reef was an ideal location. The State Marine Conservation Area is home to a large, protected shale reef, where nutrient-rich waters from the Gulf of the Farallones nourish an extraordinary community of animals and plants.
It was a hot summer afternoon, so I was glad for the ocean breeze, and I knew heat distortion wouldn’t be an issue here. But, in true amateur fashion, I’d chosen a bad time to visit. A crucial element for tide pooling is a low tide, and it turns out that in the summer, low tides are typically much earlier in the day here. When I arrived, the tide was high and would only recede briefly, so I downgraded my expectations to a scouting mission.
I took a moment to think about the cast of characters I hoped to see. Mussels, urchins, anemones, and hermit crabs came to mind, but photographing an octopus or a sea star would be the dream. With the gravitational pull of the moon a little beyond my control, though, I’d take whatever I could find.
The first living things I discovered were unlikely to stay that way for long. By-the-wind sailors (Velella velella) glimmered in the sunlight, freshly run aground by the waves. Each glass-like “sailor” knows how to go with the flow. They cruise along, completely at the mercy of the wind and waves, and epitomizing the power of the tide. I learned that they’re not actually a single organism; they’re a colony of tiny polyps that survive as a team. Beautiful, but strange. That’s what I meant when I said life here felt alien to me.
With the reef mostly underwater, I began exploring where I could. I didn’t know what I was looking for, but the next things that caught my eye were marine snails and crustaceans. Lined shore crabs (Pachygrapsus crassipes) hurried across the rocks and backed into crevices. It was fun to try some new photography techniques, but a polarizing filter would have been helpful in cutting through the surface glare. I tried dipping an action camera into these pockets of seawater and panning around. Nicolson described the underwater view as a “parkland of beauty,” and I began to see why.
Right on schedule, the tide turned. With each retreating wave, more of the reef was revealed, but the process was painfully slow. I wasn’t the only one impatiently waiting. Black oystercatchers (Haematopus bachmani) were accumulating on the rocks, so I amused myself watching them. Ultimately, the tide didn’t move far enough before it was time for me to leave. Still, I’d found my bearings and I was ready to try again at low tide.
On my second visit, I arrived at first light, and the reef was largely exposed with rock pools stretching into the distance. The tide was low, but rising, so I decided to start close to the water and work my way back.
The next few hours were a lot of fun, wandering around and studying individual pools. The intertidal zone is characterized by constant, drastic change. Submerged in cool saltwater one moment, exposed to warm air the next, I could only imagine the resilience marine life needed to thrive here. The conditions made photography challenging, too, but I learned a few things.
Firstly, I realized just how hard it is to move without disturbing any creatures. Every step is a matter of life and death for the tiny creatures that congregate there, so I tried to be as careful as possible. Equally, it’s hard enough to manage multiple cameras and lenses, but when you’re doing it all on slippery rocks, surrounded by corrosive salt water, I felt like an accident waiting to happen.
Secondly, life began to emerge when I sat quietly and observed. Camouflaged creatures like tidepool sculpin (Oligocottus maculosus) were hard to see, and my shadow easily spooked them if I moved too fast. Another reason to take my time.
And finally, photographing anything through water is tough. A polarizer helps to cut through the glare, but you need a lot of light, and even then, images are usually soft. My photos were hit-and-miss under these conditions.
That morning, I was fortunate to see an incredible variety of wildlife, but when I found a giant green anemone (Anthopleura xanthogrammica), it brought me back to the idea of how unfamiliar life feels in these spaces. At first glance, it looked like a harmless flower, but these creatures are predators, equipped with stinging cells on their tentacles to paralyze their prey. And I don’t know why you’d want to (please don’t), but apparently, if you cut some anemones in half, each part is capable of growing into whole new individuals. We share this coastline, but our realities are wildly different.
Eventually, as the tide crept back across the reef to flood the pools I was exploring, it was time to leave. I realized that I’d never found the octopus or sea star I’d hoped for, but then… as if by magic, I noticed a tiny sea star clinging to a rock. It turned out to be a dwarf mottled henricia (Henricia pumila), one of the smallest sea stars in the region. I knelt down to photograph its elegant, dappled textures. Within minutes, it disappeared under the rising tide; a perfect, fleeting example of how beautiful life can be in this place of constant change: transient, precarious… and magnificent.
