Finding sea weed for your gardening needs

I live pretty near the beach and go there often for my outdoor activities.  Sometimes, sea weed lying washed up on the beach is extremely abundant. At other times, I find nothing.  In my state, you have to be measured about cutting live seaweed.  However, you can pick up the washed up stuff and use it as you wish.  Many times I have gone in the winter or the spring to pick up some and found nothing or almost nothing.  I have gone in the summer and found a lot.  In some ways, that makes sense.  In temperate areas, growth often starts in the spring and maxes out in the late summer.  I went crabbing yesterday and found more than I could take home.  Does anyone else on here have observations about when one is likely to find seaweed?

It was wet and juicy, of course.  I left it out in the hot sun to dry and I'm turning it so it dries well.  It stores well and doesn't smell bad if it's dry.  If it stays wet, it can rot and smell very bad.  Anaerobic microbes that one would find in such situations are also not good for garden growth.  I dried out some freshwater algae this way earlier and it worked great.  I use the algae to inoculate my biochar every week during the growing season.  

John S
PDX OR

I think it will depend a lot on the prevailing winds and tides in your area. Our winds tend to blow slightly off shore, but a good storm will usually loosen up weed that then comes in on the tide. If we get a good North westerly storm, that is the best!
Our local jetty is situated on a small rocky peninsular and different sorts of seaweed are washed up in different areas, presumably depending on their relative densities. I know I can find bladder wrack normally on the same side as the slipway, whereas the kelp tends to wash up on the far side on the shingle. Bladder wrack is good for long lasting mulch, whereas the kelp disappears much faster, so presumably adds it's nutrients more quickly.

seaweed mulch on 'lazy bed'

That totally makes sense to me.  When you get offshore winds, there will be less seaweed on shore.  We only rarely get offshore winds.  

It seems to me that I find seaweed more easily in the bay than on the ocean shore.  I don't know if that's always the case.  

The winds here blow onshore more frequently in the late fall, winter, and spring.  That is when I rarely find seaweed.  In the summer, we get North, parallel winds to the shore, and I can find lots of seaweed.   Like I said, I gather it more easily in the bay than on the wave-pounded beach typically.

John S
PDX OR

Ah, bladderwrack. If only I'd known how good it is for me. I wasted many hours of my youth jumping on the bladders to hear them pop. Childhood. A time I miss. Well, kinda, sorta.

What a magnificent, free nitrogen source. I'm envious.

Douglas Alpenstock wrote:What a magnificent, free nitrogen source. I'm envious.

It is lovely - however it is also heavy when fresh and, if you don't get it fresh, quickly goes slimy and smelly as John says. For me the beach is a couple of miles away so I then need to decide which of our vehicles is OK to put salty slimy bags in the back of....We're down to one precious Volvo at the moment, and I was just thinking I could do with thinking about mulching all the beds soon for the winter. I need to get on with my Jiffy restoration (a tiny micro pickup truck), but to be honest I need a little help with getting things dismantled.

Will it rust out your pickup truck if you take it home?

Our bed is plastic and continually dirty, so I don't think it has a big impact.  I wouldn't worry about hauling it.  I wouldn't leave it there for a while if you have a metal bed in your truck. You can of course hose it down.  

John S
PDX OR

I am in Coos Bay and do a lot of seaweed collecting. I find that most bull kelp washes up in fall/winter. I collect in trash cans, and can usually fill two or three in a half hour. That said, it depends on winter storms as well as the tides as to how much washes up. Some weekends it is huge piles everywhere, some it is hardly any. Spring and summer is less bull kelp, but other species wash up a lot. Eel grass washes up pretty much constantly year round but I don't find it composts very well.

I love how we can gather information over time by listening to different observations.  When I go look for seaweed in the winter and fall, bull kelp is the one that I find the most also.  I am looking for days in which I can gather a lot.  I have never found a lot of seaweed to gather in the winter or fall.  When I find a lot, it is not mostly bull kelp.  I like the idea of a wide variety of seaweed, as they probably have different nutritional characteristics.  I wonder if one factor is that there is a lot more population near Portland than near Coos Bay, which, for those who don't know, are many hours away from each other-7? I also live 1 1/2 hours from the beach, so I can't go all the time, and when I do, I'm usually on a different type of outdoor adventure trip.  I find bull kelp to be a little more work than other kinds of seaweed. It comes in large, thick pieces which need to be chopped up in order to be optimal for gardening needs, IMHO.  Still, it's way better than finding no sea weed.  When I have a day in which I gather a lot, I forget about it and don't need to gather any more for a long time.  

John S
PDX OR

Jim Brewer wrote:Will it rust out your pickup truck if you take it home?

Oh, I just saw this reply - my truck bed is thick ply, so no rust there - the chassis will be well painted and waxed. I'm close to the sea and get salt laden winds all the time so everything metal needs protection outside.

I used to collect bull kelp on the beach near Florence, Oregon in the fall and early winter. (I'm not really sure when the best time to gather it is, though.) I used a machete to chop it into pieces and then throw it inside plastic garbage bags. Once I got it home, I'd soak it in water in 55 gallon barrels for a few days, then dump out the water away from the garden in order to get rid some of the excess salt. After soaking, I'd use the seaweed as mulch in the orchard or use it in the compost pile.

Kelp meal is an excellent source of potassium and trace minerals, but is super expensive and increasing in price. So gathering bull kelp is an excellent free substitute for people who like free organic fertilizer. If I still had a pickup, I'd probably still gather it.