There are thousands of dead Jellyfish on the Ocean Beach in San Francisco Bay.
Not from the natural beauty of sand, surf and sea, but from a slick of dead jellyfish that washed up near Pacheco Street.
More than 10,000 of the gooey invertebrates, each about the size of a dinner plate, drifted onto the beach Friday evening.They attracted a lot of the curious, the repulsed and the fascinated.
Kids stomped.Dogs were rolling in them.Surfers threw them at each other.Some people pressed in with cameras while others hid.
I first saw it and wondered if I was hallucinating.As she walked her dog through the slimy area on Sunday morning, she said, "Nan Madden of San Francisco."I've never seen anything like that before.I sent pictures to my kids.
Thousands of brainless, heartless, headless creatures have washed up on Ocean Beach before.Thousands of by-the-wind sailors visited the shoreline in 2004.
Experts said that the phenomenon is nothing to be alarmed about.The blooms tend to congregate in groups, called blooms, and tides, wind, swells and currents sometimes combine to send the blooms to the beach.Before the jelly invasion, Ocean Beach had seen a heavy swell.
"This is a good time to take a close look, because when the tide comes in they'll be gone, back into the soup of the ocean," said Ken Peterson, a spokesman for the Monterey Bay Aquarium.You might want to hold your nose.
According to a marine biologist at the Aquarium of the Bay at Pier 39, Jellyfish have been washing up in San Francisco Bay for 500 million years.
He said that they were a normal resident.There are perfect conditions for them here.This is a natural phenomenon.
The California coast is home to about 20 different types of jellyfish.Leatherback sea turtles swim 8,600 miles from Indonesia to feast on them.
The experts said moon jellies have a pink hue and leave flowers in the sand when they dry up.
Portuguese man o' war or box jellies can be fatal to humans, but moon jellies are tamer.Moon Jelly Stings are not harmful to human skin.Unless a person has an allergy to moon toxins, they might not know they've been stung.
Ocean Beach's jellies are not recommended to be barefoot or coddled bare-handed.Jellyfish sting can release toxins even after they're dead.
"They look like water, so I poked them with a rock," said Flores.These are bigger than the tiny ones I saw.
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