Harbinger of treasures

ABERDEEN, Wash. — Thousands of purplish-blue jellyfish washed ashore recently along the beach at Ocean City.

Most people out for a morning stroll didn’t give it a second thought, but those with a trained eye and a quest for elusive glass floats and other sea treasures watched closely.

They know that the sight of the velella — a jellyfish commonly called “sailor by the wind” — is an indication of good things to come.

“This is really cool,” says Alan Rammer, of the state Department of Fish & Wildlife’s marine conservation and education division. “This is the number one sign that a bounty is about to happen.”

Rammer knows all about watching the tides to find washed-up treasures. He also knows that velella often wash ashore in the late spring or early summer and many people can go their whole lives without seeing the tiny jellyfish first-hand.

“They’re like little beach sailboats,” he says as he watches the velella float on the surface of the water with its clear cellophane-like sail. Most people don’t get to see them. Timing is everything.”

Way out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, hundreds of thousands of velella float on the surface of the water, bobbing around with the currents.

As long as the wind stays moderate, they simply float through life out in the deep blue sea. In the Northwest, the velella’s sail is set at a 45 degree angle in the northwest to southeast position to catch the light southerly winds and keep it off shore.

But, when the winds shift to a strong westerly, the velella loses its tacking ability, begins spinning and follows the wind.

“Day after day of strong westerly winds sets these guys topsy-turvy,” Rammer says. “They then get carried with the tide and pile up on the beach.”

That’s the beginning of the end of the velella.

The animals are estimated to be 98.9 percent water, so once they get washed ashore by the tide, they have only about a couple of days before all that’s left is their clear, dried sail that looks like little white cellophane floating across the beach.

When the velella start to decompose and rot, it creates a purple-blue gelatin mass that can be dangerously slick to beachcombers, Rammer said.

People who study the progression of the tides know that Dixie cups, plastic water bottles and light man-made debris will follow the velella to shore.

Then the treasures start coming in — big glass floats. A short time later, the smaller and smaller glass floats and messages in bottles follow.

Last year, the winds were just right to create a 25-year event, Rammer says.

“Just hundreds, if not thousands, of glass floats were found and notes in bottles,” Rammer says, noting that he found a note in a bottle and nine glass floats. “It was an anomaly.”