As you look around Sand Bay beach, you should notice two distinct things. First is that the beach has a very uneven appearance and second is the large amount of vegetation here. But there is no soil, only sand- the plants here grow on mounds known as sand dunes.
Sand Dunes
A sand dune is "a mound or hill of sand built by wind or the flow of water", beyond the maximum extent of waves. They can occur in different shapes and sizes, dependent on the interaction with the flow of air or water.
They are formed when wind-blown and sea-deposited sand accumulates against an obstruction such as rocks or vegetation. In the case of Sand Bay, it is the artificial roads and infrastructure that has been built along the seafront, and is the trigger for the dunes to grow here. However, dunes always grow parallel of the seafront.
There is a constant input of sand from Longshore Drift, a process by which sediment (including sand) is transported in a zig-zag direction along a beach, determined by the wind and wave directions. Swash (water coming in) and prevailing wind pushes sand up the beach, and backwash (water coming out) pushes material down the beach. Longshore Drift transports the sand enough for it to deposit and accumulate onto a dune.
As more sand deposits and accumulates, the dune grows, and forms the uneven mounds you see here. Vegetation can form on dunes (and has here), as sand can absorb water, allowing them to grow. Roots of vegetation bind the sand in the dunes together.
The vegetation has since taken over the dunes here, giving a sight of green along the beach, as far as the eyes can see. This is helped as the dunes give humus (nutrients) to the dunes.
This has allowed a diverse ecosystem to thrive here, so where possible, please avoid treading on the plants on the dunes.
Questions
To claim a find on this Earthcache, you must answer the questions below in an email/message to me within 24 hours of logging a find. Any drastically wrong or incomplete answers or any logs from a cacher without sent answers risks their log being deleted. Any photos that reveal answers will also be deleted.
1) How high are the dunes here? Look along the beach to the north, how do the dunes change in terms of size?
2) Wind is an essential part of dune formation. What is the wind like (speed, direction, etc.) when you visited this Earthcache? Can you see any effects of this wind and where is this happening?
3) Scoop a handful of sand and describe what you see eg. Colour, smoothness, particles, shells and fragments within it, etc.
4) How do you think the plants on the dune help in preventing the sand dunes from erosion?
5) TO PROVE YOU VISITED: On the bench at GZ, there is a seat dedicated to a Mr Moran. What was his first name?
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If you would like to add more caches to this series, please feel free to do so! Please contact heartradio through his profile first so that he can keep track of numbers and avoid duplications.
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As part of the 13th International Earthcache Day (October 2015) I challenged myself to place an Earthcache every month until Earthcache day 2016, kicking it off with GC62T8F. This Earthcache is number 10 in that challenge (July 2016).
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