It's Like Pokemon Go for Beach Nerds!
How my mobile phone is my nature journal too
I’m located in the Pacific Northwest and live near the part of the Salish Sea called Puget Sound. The nearest beaches are just a 10 minute drive away. For me, living here makes it very easy to find a sense of gratitude and abundance. There are so many interesting creatures and so many beautiful seaweeds to find on our beaches, especially at low tide. I have spent many days this summer on the beach at low tide.
I like to describe the drive to find and identify the many seaweeds and animals, especially the red seaweeds and the nudibranchs, as like playing Pokemon Go but for beach naturalist nerds. Admittedly, I’ve never played Pokemon Go but I know that you use your phone to “capture” different characters. That’s exactly what I do! The animals and seaweeds, in their variety, have so much character and when I find one for the first time (or the fiftieth) I like to snap a photo or a short video and add that to my “collection.” Birders have their bird lists. I have my nudibranchs list! And my chitons list. And my anemones list! You get the picture.
And speaking of pictures…as you might imagine, wading in water or walking where rocks are wet and slippery and poky don’t make it easy or comfortable - barnacles are sharp, ouch!- to stop and do a sketch. So, how do I nature journal while tide pooling? That’s where my phone comes in.
A little voice used to say to me, “Alma, a true nature journal keeper would draw this. Stop, slow down, smell the seaweed, draw.” I have done some drawing in response to this voice (while sitting on a smooth, dry rock) but that just didn’t stick. First, there is rarely a conveniently dry, smooth rock to sit on. Second, at a tide pool, many animals only come out where it is wet! Third, the tide doesn’t wait. Time sketching means time away from looking. Also, I’m an on-the-go journal keeper, remember? I don’t have a practice of snapping pictures then drawing from these when I get home later. So what happens while on my walk is it for journaling.
My phone is my main journaling tool while walking at a tide-pool but sometimes I do get out my notebook and make some notes: location, weather, tide, pros and cons of the location, seasonal observations. I can do these quickly. I sometimes make a landscape before walking - if I need to wait for the tide to get low enough. More often though, I make a landscape after the walk.
Taking photos but keeping a list of species, or making notes about the tide and weather, or doing a small landscape while I wait for more beach to be exposed in my small pocket-sized notebook and letting this mosaic of technologies be my nature journal practice is how I cast aside restrictive notions of what a nature journal should look like or a practice should be like and embrace what simply works for me. I do believe there is time and place for “should” but I try my best to keep my creativity and my relationship with nature journaling free of “should” and more open to simply what gives me the connection to nature I want.
What’s your favorite or go-to way to keep a nature journal or fosters you connection with the natural world? I hope you will share this with me in the comments.
Sincerely,
Alma
A Wild Braid Nature Journal is part of my A Wild Braid project in which my mission is to show ways that nature walking, nature journaling, and creativity can be easily accessible, especially for those who think they have no time or have no artistic skill. To learn more, please visit www.awildbraid.com.
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Wonderful photos of nudibranchs and the chiton! I do love the practice of being present, observing, taking photos and journaling simple pages later for learning and remembering the experience!
Alma! Those photos are wonderful. I was thinking this morning - do you have an inaturalist account?