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Brown Waves Puzzle North Oregon Coast Visitors

Brown waves are thick at Hug Point, just south of Cannon Beach

(Cannon Beach, Oregon) – A run of thick brown goo has been causing a buzz on the north Oregon coast over the busy weekend, causing puzzled expressions among tourists and a run of questions to local businesses.

It’s not pollution. It’s not algae. It’s not an oil spill from a shipwreck, nor is it sewage or sludge of some sort.

The brown waves that have appeared at Seaside and in the Cannon Beach area in recent days are actually a good thing.

It’s actually a form of phytoplankton causing all the raucous - the basic, bottom of the food chain in the ocean on which most all life depends. They’re called diatoms, and they are microscopic plant-like creatures that are actually responsible for most all sea foam you see on the beaches. They are about 100 micrometers long – or 1000 times the size of a virus. Still, they’re not visible with the naked eye.

Brown waves just south of Cannon Beach

This particular form of phytoplankton is so abundant right now on the north coast that it’s causing really dark patches along with very dark, brown chunks of foam. It also creates dark, oily-looking patches in the sand as well as large tracts of brown foam and goo along the beaches.

This phenomenon seems to happen more regularly and to a greater degree in Seaside, but this time it’s showing up bigger south of Cannon Beach, along with a fair amount of brown waves in Seaside.

“It’s a good thing,” said Keith Chandler, manager of the Seaside Aquarium. “It’s a healthy thing. It’s just a lot of diatoms.”

When diatoms get so abundant in the ocean, they may wash ashore during storms or westerly winds. This usually happens early spring, mid summer, and early fall. It’s another natural occurrence that can contribute to the giant floating masses of brown foam.

Brown goo makes waves in Seaside (photo Tiffany Boothe, Seaside Aquarium)

Often, storms agitate the surf and apparently bring the diatoms up from the depths a bit more. However, there haven’t been any significant storms in recent days, so its cause is puzzling.

Even more puzzling is the sporadic way it’s showing up on the north coast. It’s prevalent around Hug Point, but a few hundred yards to the south, at Arch Cape, it’s almost nonexistent. It appeared sporadically in Cannon Beach on Saturday, but not at all on Friday.

Seaside saw a heavy spate of it on Friday, and not as much on Saturday. Further up north, at the wreck of the Peter Iredale, near Warrenton, none of it was visible.

Chandler said it comes and goes with the tides. Sometimes it’s more prominent, others it’s not as obvious.

Seaside: photo Boothe

Tiffany Boothe, with the Seaside Aquarium, said the creatures leave behind residue after they scarf down the nitrates and phosphates, which creates more interesting scenery on the coast. “They leave behind carbohydrates, fats, proteins and vitamins,” Boothe said. “Their bodies also store oil to live on. If you look closely at the bubbles created by phytoplankton you will notice that they look as if they have oil in them, as in the photographs here.”

The brown diatom patches leave these dark stains on the beaches because of the materials in their bodies. “It’s not really so much of a stain as it is a lot of the stuff accumulates on the beaches,” Chandler said. “The stuff, like the brown bubbles, feels a little oily, but that doesn’t mean it is oil. It just comes from a lot of it piling on the beaches. The tide will come and clean it out. Just like a ketchup stain – it comes right out.”

Close-up of brown foam (photo Boothe)

There were thick brown stains on the sands of Hug Point on Saturday, as tourists flocked there to see the geological oddities called “red towers” and to hunt for agates – both the result of extremely low sand levels.

Diatoms and other types of phytoplankton are also largely responsible for the regular sea foam you see on the coastline. Those bubbles that hit the beaches are from the breakdown of the skeletons of phytoplankton. High winds and heavy surf whip air into the water, and when combined with the dissolved organic matter from the phytoplankton, these help create the bubbles.

Everything in the ocean feeds on diatoms and other plankton, either directly or indirectly. Even the great baleen whales filter planktons and diatoms for part of their diet.

Other wild sights are sometimes on tap because of another form of phytoplankton called dinoflagellates. These little creatures glow in the water at night, and on the beaches for a few hours after washing up on shore. It’s nicknamed “glowing sands” because they emit a faint, bluish, green glow when stepped on or disturbed. This is only visible in very dark conditions at night.

This phenomenon sometimes follows such high-density diatom events as the north coast is experiencing now.

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