EDMONDS — Touching sea stars, crabs and startling tube worms are all part of the duties for beach docents.
Julene Gradwohl, who first volunteered for the program last summer, said helping the public learn more about the beach environment is one of the things she most enjoys. “I love to see the excitement on the faces of the children, and adults, when they see how a sea anemone catches and eats an entire fish,” she said.
The Edmonds Parks and Recreation program is looking for more volunteers to serve as docents this summer. The application deadline is June 16 and training begins June 23. Volunteers are asked to donate at least 10 weekend hours in July and August, said Sally Lider, the city’s environmental education coordinator.
Nancy Engen, who has worked as a docent for about four years, said she loves showing people the animals that can be seen on minus tides.
“The lower it is, the better,” she said. People are astonished when they’re walking in areas where water would normally be over their heads when the tide comes in, she said.
Low tides can expose moon snail egg collars that might just look like “rubbery sort of trash down there,” she said. The ring collars contain thousands of eggs, she said.
And she explained to a little boy that the barnacles he was smashing actually have living creatures inside, she said, “He found it hard to believe.”
The city has sponsored the beach docent program since 1993 and about 300 volunteers have participated, Lider said. The program operates out of the Olympic Beach Visitors Center near the Edmonds pier. The station is open from noon until 5 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays, and from noon until 3 p.m. weekdays during the summer.
Some out-of-town visitors, unfamiliar with tides, have looked out at Puget Sound and asked if it’s a river, Lider said. “There’s a lot of people who don’t live near a coast with tides that go in and out.”
Docent Gradwohl, 55, a life-long Edmonds resident, said she’s learned a lot about the creatures that live in the intertidal areas. Visitors leave with “a new appreciation for what lives just beneath the surface of Puget Sound and why it is important for all of us to do our part in taking care of it,” she said.
Engen, 63, said sea slugs are one of her favorite things to spot on beach walks. “I will carefully pick them up to show people — and I wouldn’t touch a garden slug,” she said. Visitors often are surprised to hear that there are sponges nearby, expecting them to be found only in tropical waters, she said.
“I love going down there,” Engen said. “I love to look around and say, ‘Gee, who else can I show this to?’?”
Sharon Salyer: 425-339-3486; salyer@heraldnet.com.
Volunteers sought
Edmonds Parks and Recreation is looking for people who want to spend a few hours volunteering as beach docents this summer at the Olympic Beach Visitor Station near the Edmonds pier. The application deadline is June 16 and training begins June 23. Call Sally Lider at 425-771-0227 or email sally.lider@edmondswa.gov to request an application.
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