Volunteers needed for daily beach monitoring
The Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Foundation (SCCF) began daily monitoring of Tarpon Bay Beach early last summer as part of a project coordinated by Mote Marine Laboratory to check beach conditions along the Gulf Coast.
The Foundation is looking for volunteers who can take on the monitoring project, which requires about five minutes daily.
Ideally, Mote would like the beach checked twice – at 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. – seven days a week, but SCCF has been monitoring Monday through Friday at around noon. The beach is checked near the Tarpon Bay Road access for water color, wind direction, surf conditions, presence of dead fish, respiratory irritation, the presence or absence of red drift algae and its location on the beach, if there is any. The project was originally set up to monitor the occurrence of Red Tide, which is why respiratory irritation is measured.
Conditions are transmitted to Mote by filling out a simple form on their Web site. The reports can be accessed at http://coolgate.mote.org/beachconditions.
If we have enough volunteers, we can coordinate scheduling so that one person is not monitoring every day. If you would like to volunteer, please contact SCCF Marine Lab Director Loren Coen at 395-4617 or e-mail at lcoen@sccf.org.