California Tide Pools

The tables below give each beach's lowest window of the 30 days, region by region from south to north, with the shore its page describes. The ratings compare tides, not reefs: two very good days on two beaches are equally low tides on different shores. Follow a beach's link for every window, the week's tide table and its local rules.

The southern beaches run from the Santa Barbara coast to the tip of Point Loma, where the Point Loma tide pools are the rocky shore of Cabrillo National Monument. In La Jolla, the pools lie at both ends of La Jolla Shores and on the flats of Point La Jolla beside the Cove. The Corona del Mar tide pools are at Little Corona, at the foot of Poppy Avenue. Laguna Beach has docents at Treasure Island Beach, Malibu's pools sit around Sequit Point in Leo Carrillo State Park, and west of Santa Barbara a broad reef comes out of the water at Coal Oil Point, near Isla Vista.

In Southern California, the lowest daylight tide of the 30 days is −1.5 ft on Wednesday, November 25, at Santa Barbara at 4:26 PM, Malibu at 4:04 PM, Newport Beach at 3:57 PM, Corona del Mar at 3:57 PM and La Jolla at 3:55 PM. Its eight beaches have 10 to 12 very good windows each. Two pairs of pages share their NOAA predictions for tide pool days: Newport Beach and Corona del Mar, and San Diego and Point Loma.

On the Central Coast, the Monterey tide pools page points to the Great Tide Pool on Point Pinos, in Pacific Grove next door, where the marine biologist Ed Ricketts collected shore animals. Across Monterey Bay, State Parks docents lead low tide walks at Natural Bridges State Beach on West Cliff Drive in Santa Cruz. Farther south, Pismo Beach's pools are below the oceanfront parks of Shell Beach, such as Margo Dodd Park and Eldwayen Ocean Park.

In Central California, the lowest daylight tide of the 30 days is −1.3 ft on Tuesday, November 24, at Santa Cruz at 4:17 PM, Monterey at 4:28 PM and Pismo Beach at 4:02 PM. Its three beaches have 8 to 9 very good windows each.

Both northern beaches with ratings are on the San Mateo County coast south of San Francisco, and both point to the same reef. The Fitzgerald Marine Reserve tide pools page is about the county park in Moss Beach, just north of Pillar Point Harbor, where volunteer naturalists walk the reef on weekends and holidays. The Half Moon Bay tide pools page rates the same days and lists other tide pool beaches down the coast, such as Pescadero State Beach and Pigeon Point.

In Northern California, the lowest daylight tide of the 30 days is −1.6 ft on Tuesday, November 24, at Fitzgerald Marine Reserve and Half Moon Bay at 4:31 PM. Each of its two beaches has 9 very good windows. Fitzgerald Marine Reserve and Half Moon Bay use the same NOAA predictions for their tide pool days.

Much of the shore on this page lies inside state marine protected areas. In a state marine reserve, the state's rules make it unlawful to injure, damage, take or keep any living, geological or cultural marine resource: not a snail and not a stone. Reserves cover the pools at Cabrillo on Point Loma, Matlahuayl in La Jolla, much of Laguna Beach, Natural Bridges in Santa Cruz, Asilomar beside Point Pinos and Montara around Fitzgerald Marine Reserve. A state marine conservation area allows only the uses its own rules name; at Crystal Cove, between Corona del Mar and Laguna, those rules forbid taking any living thing from inside the tide pools. The Department of Fish and Wildlife's protected area pages have the maps and the rules for each one.

Collecting is not banned everywhere, but it is narrow. Nothing at all may be taken in a state marine reserve. In state marine parks and conservation areas, each area's own rules may limit what can be taken. Elsewhere, in tide pools and the shore out to 1,000 feet beyond the low tide line, state rules allow only a listed set of species, such as mussels, limpets, turban snails, crabs, octopuses and sea urchins, and only for people 16 and older with a fishing license, within the limits for each species.

Parks and towns add rules of their own. California State Parks says collecting most plants, animals, shells and even rocks from state beaches and parks is illegal. Cabrillo's rules forbid picking up or removing animals, plants, shells, sand or rocks; San Mateo County asks visitors at Fitzgerald to look without handling and to use no containers; and Newport Beach forbids removing anything from its tide pools, even for a moment, from Corona del Mar State Beach south.

Put your feet on bare rock. California State Parks' guide gives two reasons: seaweed is slick underfoot, and animals live under it and under loose stones. In a group, walk in a line and step where the person ahead stepped, so the same few spots take the wear.

Look before you reach. The guide's advice is to watch an animal where it is, since it usually does more there than in a hand. If you turn over a rock, turn it back the way it lay; if you lift an animal, wet your hands first and set it down in the exact spot it came from, because many depend on one crack or hollow. Anything that holds on to the rock stays there: a hard pull can kill it.

Local rules can be stricter than that. At Fitzgerald Marine Reserve the county asks visitors to look only, and not to touch or handle marine life. At Cabrillo, the Park Service's rules say never to touch or disturb an octopus, with hands or objects, and not to move any plant or animal if it could be hurt, however slightly. Each beach's page has its own rules.

Plan to arrive before the low tide and follow the water out, as the State Parks guide suggests. Check the surf forecast before you go: the guide warns that large waves can come at any time of year, and that near the water you should keep facing the ocean. Old sneakers grip better than sandals; on slick rock, get low and use your hands as well as your feet. Watch for urchin spines and sharp barnacles, and leave the cliffs behind the pools alone.