Thousands visit Laguna Beach daily to enjoy its coastline. For the Laguna Ocean Foundation, that presents an opportunity to advance its mission of protecting marine life.
Main Beach may be filled with those frolicking in the sand and surf, but not far to the north, one can find the tidepools of Heisler Park.
That is where a guided tour took guests to learn more about the ecosystem and the organisms that inhabit it Wednesday evening, directly preceding the launch of the “Tides of Change” speaker series.
The Laguna Ocean Foundation event, held at the Rivian South Coast Theater, kicked off a quarterly celebration of community action, conservation and ocean science.
Brendan Talwar, a shark researcher at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography who is featured in a Netflix series “All the Sharks,” grabbed the audience’s attention with an opening anecdote that sounded like narrative poetry.
He revisited his shark-seeking adventures, bringing them along for the ride by activating their senses with his diction, calling on them to reconnect with nature and remember the place where they left a piece of their soul. For Talwar, one of those places was Deep Creek in the Bahamas.
“I bet we feel the same when we’re there,” Talwar said after asking the crowd to think of their own special place. “Peace, warmth, joy, love — an overflowing cup — and maybe most of all, we feel the humbling awareness of our smallness, often in the face of the enormity. The enormity of the landscape — a sky full of stars, an ocean, ocean conservation.
“We feel small, irrelevant and powerless, and yet there’s something so magnetic about that smallness, we’re drawn in again and again, and once we move through it and embrace it, there’s a release, there’s a freedom. Bound up within is an awareness. We depend on all else, and all else depends on us.”
Talwar shared stories and visuals from his travels to Australia, the Bahamas, the Galápagos Islands, the Maldives and South Africa to find the sharks, adding reflections on the importance of marine-protected areas and the risks of over-fishing.
“A conservationist is one who is humbly aware that with each stroke, he is writing his signature on the face of this land,” Talwar said. “Just as with each stroke of the ax, we sign our land, with each net we set, with each fish we take, and with each choice that we all make, we write our signature on the face of the sea. How will it look going forward?
“My hope is that it tells a story of connection, recognized and honored, of us accepting our role as architects and wise engineers, with humility, foresight and the long view in mind. … We can choose to write a signature worthy of smallness in the face of grandeur.”
Laguna Ocean Foundation annually hosts KelpFest, which celebrates kelp forest restoration and brings together organizations that work with the local coastal ecosystem. It also organizes beach cleanups and visits classrooms.
The tidewater docent program was established in 2002, and those who joined the guided tour were taken out to the tidepools adjacent to Bird Rock, where they found starburst anemone, hermit crabs and gooseneck barnacles, among other forms of life, in the no-take, marine-protected area.
Docents were also stationed at the tidepools at Crescent Bay, Goff Island, Shaws Cove, Treasure Island and Woods Cove.
Alayna Ader, education and leadership manager of Laguna Ocean Foundation, said the organization’s work is tailored toward helping future generations build a connection with the ocean, so that they have the chance to become environmental stewards and potentially pursue related careers.
“These resources, they still need to be around for them to do so,” Ader added. “Five years, 50 years from now. This is why we do it.”
The event also recognized the Drew Forbes Memorial Fund for a $100,000 gift that Laguna Ocean Foundation Vice Vhair Ed Almanza said has helped the group build up capacity while supporting expanded programming.
As Laguna Beach grapples with how it can best handle its high volume of visitors, the city has turned to destination stewardship. Mayor Pro Tem Mark Orgill took to the podium and noted Laguna Ocean Foundation is a partner in that.
“We all see Laguna Ocean Foundation tidepool educators and docents out on the rocks,” Orgill said. “There are boots on the ground for tidepool protection, but the foundation does a lot more important work that is less visible. They are actively helping us understand how to implement effective policies related to resource protection, visitor management.