Beach Observations

Location: Wildwood Crest Beach
I lay, eyes closed, on my fish-patterned towel. The warm wind rushing past echoes the sounds of the waves pounding against the shore...

A faint cry, “Mommy, mommy!”, prompts me to break away from my pensive moment and look up. My ears tune in further, my eyes skim the shoreline. After a moment of lazed searching, I locate the owner of the distressed voice -- a young boy in hawaii-themed swim trunks, not far to my left. With his back facing the ocean, his widened eyes scan the throng of nameless people that crowd the beach, frantically searching for a towel, an umbrella… any inkling of familiarity amongst an overwhelming sea of anonymity.

In my mind I wait with this boy as he stands distraught on the sand. After several gripping seconds, the boy’s mother calls out to him. I breathe a silent sigh of relief as his round, youthful face relaxes and an innocent smile spreads across his lips. He runs to his mother, who sits a little ways down the shore. A few moments later, he is wrapped in a towel, curled up in his mother’s arms. He stays that way for a long time.

In life, we let ourselves be carried away by the current, allowing ourselves to drift further and further from the known into the infinite expanse of the unknown. Sometimes, when we exit the frenzy of crashing waves and the seemingly endless stretch of dark, green water, we can find ourselves frantically desiring familiarity in this world can be so big and strange.

Iced-Tea River

Location: Batsto River
The water in the Batsto River, along with many rivers in the Pine Barrens, is a rich shade of reddish brown. Many that I was with when we visited the river described it as the color of iced tea. The color of the river can be attributed to the large amounts of iron in the river bed but also to tannin, a brownish compound found in oaks and pines that is a poison to protect against insects, that leaks from oak trees. Although truly an amazing wonder to see a river of this color, it dyes our shirts and bathing suit and, temporarily, even our skin.

Coming Storm

Location: Great Bay Estuary

The boat with its tearing bow parted the waters the estuary, which were grey with the reflection of the ominous clouds above upon them. It was rushing toward the research station, vying to beat the storm which so evidently was here.

A wall of angry clouds, the color of ash and smoke that would arise from a forest fire of serrotinous pitch pines, has a face-off with our boat, its bow pointing accusingly at the accumulations. The captain breaks the confrontation at times and veers through the water, spraying us with the reflective, semi-salt water. Far off and behind a bridge, I observe a light gray veil of rain that has descended over the houses and forest. Above these regions, the clouds seem to blend with the sky. The falling water vapor causes downward streaks at the bottom of the clouds, obscuring the usually distinct line between them and the sky.

A drop of rain hits my arm. We have reached the storm.

Horseshoe Crab

Location: Strathmere Beach

Helpless against all these people that surround it, when someone picks up the horseshoe crab, in a futile attempt to protect itself, the crab curls its tail upward against its middle. In the ocean, the crab has a shell to shield and protect it. But held upside-down, its whole body that is normally so protected is exposed to the elements and the vying eyes of human onlookers.


I feel bad for it. Its little claws move slowly in the air, in unfamiliar territory away from the water and exposed to the sun. After observing the crab for a period of time, we walk it away from where the swimmers are to where it can return to its aquatic home in peace. Little boys that we showed the crab to earlier enter the water and try to play with it, but we warn them to let it be.

The Arm of a Fiddler Crab

Location: Strathmere Beach

I found a crab arm on the beach. It smelled strongly of the ocean and was probably decaying, but I picked it up nonetheless. The arm was a shade of grayish-white, decorated with maroon speckles. I identified it as most likely the arm and claw of a fiddler crab.

The first thing I did was ask questions to myself that I knew I would never know the answers to. Is a crab still out there somewhere, alive and missing its right claw? If this is true, how did it lose its claw? Was it the work of a fisherman, a predator, or a disease? Was this missing limb the work of man or an accident of nature? Although the answers these questions will never be found out, I love to wonder what the answers may be. To me, this is just as valuable as knowing every answer in the world.

Discovered: Huckleberry Sphinx Moth

Location: outside of the computer lab at Richard Stockton College Housing IV area

This moth is known as the huckleberry sphinx moth, quite a rare find in the Pine Barrens. It was not moving, situated on the wall of the computer lab in Building 80 on campus. The rich blend of colors that painted its body, varying shades of orange and red, reminded me of the sedimentary layers of the Red Rocks, the results of copper deposits, in Arizona. The shape of the wings resembled those of a fighter jet airplane. Its abdomen was curved like a crescent moon, indicating it was male.

Duck Dance

Location: Richard Stockton Marine Science and Environmental Field Station

Muscovy ducks, blotched black and white, like cows, with an accent of red on their beaks and around their eyes, like to dance. We observed two members of this unusual-looking species of farm duck as we walked back to the field station after our boat ride through the estuary.

The male duck struts down the path, bobbing its head unfailingly, toward a female. As he gets closer, he wags his black-feathered tail like a dog. The female does a similar tail-wag. The male continues to walk around the female, bobbing its head and wiggling its tail. At just the right time, the female spreads out its blotched black and white wings, revealing a long, majestic extension of white feathers on their under-side. She faced the male in this pose, as if to tell him, “I am too good for you”. The male, probably taken aback and embarrassed, redirects his attention to a log fence nearby and moves on, wiggling tail and all.

We notice a whole flock of these strange ducks not too far off, bobbing their heads and wagging their tails. What strange creatures.

Steve Everett, a scientist working with Stockton, tells us, “You can take them. All they do is roam.”