Spill Shows a Little Oil Fouls Marsh in a Big Way

Sunday-morning hikers could sense something was eerily wrong at Bolsa Chica. A thin sheen of oil, first spotted a week ago today, glinted on the bird-rich bay. Foul stuff lay thicker still on a nearby flood control channel where it feeds into one of the most famous wetlands in Southern California.

But only the next day did the spill’s enormity start coming into focus. That was when state biologist Tom Napoli followed the channel miles inland and discovered a trail of damage: tainted water, dozens of heavily oiled birds, stately herons and egrets with oil on their breast feathers, a normally sandy-colored curlew with a sheen so peculiarly green it looked like an exotic zoo animal.

“We went, ‘Holy smokes,’ ” recalled Napoli, an environmental expert with the state Department of Fish and Game who helped oversee last week’s response at Bolsa Chica. Some call the spill the most biologically damaging in Orange County since 1990, when the infamous ruptured tanker called the American Trader blackened miles of coastline.

While television cameras last week pinpointed oil-soaked birds at Bolsa, biologists worry that many more creatures--fish, insects, mud-dwelling worms, even predatory hawks and possums--may have been harmed if the pollution tainted the mud flats and spread through the food chain. It may never be known, they say, exactly how much the spill damaged one of the state’s most important oases for migratory birds.

What makes the Bolsa Chica drama especially troubling, scientists say, is that it dramatically brings home how a seemingly small amount of pollution can wreak environmental havoc that may linger for years. When precious remnants of coastal wetlands turn into islands amid the Southern California megalopolis, their wealth of wildlife becomes acutely vulnerable to pollution.

“A lesson here,” said UC Davis wildlife expert Dan Anderson, “is that you don’t need to have a big oil spill to cause a lot of damage.”

Authorities say an unknown culprit dumped 100 to 200 gallons of waste oil into the channel--a minuscule amount compared to the 400,000 gallons of Alaskan crude that spewed into the ocean in 1990 off Huntington Beach.

But that 100 gallons or more headed right for one of the most important oases for migratory birds along California’s Pacific Coast during a season of migration, when birds from Alaska and Canada feed alongside local waterfowl in the spacious mud flats teeming with insects and worms.

“It’s the McDonald’s along the 101” for these birds, said U.S. Coast Guard Petty Officer Steve Kegelman, who worked on the Bolsa Chica cleanup.

“This is one of the largest bird concentrations in Southern California, right here at Bolsa Chica,” said Dr. Scott Newman, a veterinarian with the state Oiled Wildlife Care Network who worked around the clock last week treating dozens of birds.

So a spill that could have been trivial miles offshore delivered a wallop to wildlife, killing at least 45 birds so far, potentially harming or killing several hundred others and sparking a federal and state cleanup effort that racked up $175,000 in costs over only three days. While most oil was contained in the channel, some escaped into Inner and Outer Bolsa Bay, the long lagoons flanking Pacific Coast Highway.

“Even a small amount of oil in those wetlands can have a huge impact,” said Jonna Mazet, director of the Oiled Wildlife Care Network based at the veterinary school at UC Davis.

Investigators Still Trying to Find Culprit

To the uneducated eye, Bolsa Chica looked almost normal late last week as cleanup crews removed some booms set up earlier to contain the oil. Water glistened without a tell-tale oily sheen in Inner and Outer Bolsa Bay.

But as Napoli patrolled the shore flanking the outer bay Thursday, his boot left a print in the mud that swiftly filled with water and the tell-tale swirls of gleaming, copper-colored oil.

Meanwhile, investigators say they are still trying to find who caused the spill, which apparently began at a Garden Grove municipal yard near the East Garden Grove-Wintersburg Flood Control Channel more than 13 miles inland. Authorities reported last week that the oil apparently came from a holding tank that was not even designed to hold oil, and Garden Grove officials are blaming an unknown “midnight dumper,” saying they doubt the culprit was even associated with the city.

A probe is being conducted jointly by the U.S. Coast Guard, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, state Fish and Game and Garden Grove police. Among other evidence investigators are examining are videotapes from surveillance cameras in the yard.

Authorities describe the pollutant as waste lubricating oil mixed with solvents--a mix that some say can be more damaging than crude oil to birds and other wildlife. Waste oil from automobile engines, for instance, could contain high amounts of lead. Laboratory tests are determining what the oil contained in hopes of identifying the dumper as well as judging how wildlife might be harmed. But waste oil can contain a witch’s brew of contaminants, complicating the lab work, experts say.

“The difficulty of dealing with waste oil is that we won’t know all the chemical properties of the product until we’re done with the birds,” said Mazet.

For Birds, Oil Spill Is a ‘Double Whammy’

Birds can be the most vulnerable creatures during oil spills because exposure can both poison them and destroy their natural protection--what Mazet calls “a double whammy.”

Spots of oil on a wild bird’s feathers can act just like a hole in a surfer’s wetsuit. They allow water to penetrate the bird’s natural covering, seeping into the trapped layer of warm air within the bird’s feathers.

That leaves the birds wet, chilly and vulnerable, especially when night temperatures drop in winter. With their wings weighed down with oil, the birds can’t fly and forage for food, so they run out of energy. They often die in out-of-the-way spots, found only by predators and never counted in the tallies of dead wildlife.

Oil also can hurt birds directly: They swallow the potentially toxic oil as they preen their feathers to remove it. And some oil products contain volatile chemicals that can also burn their skin and singe their lungs.

Even those birds found and treated can face an uphill battle to regain their health, some experts said.

“There’s so much shock to their systems, they can have a hard time,” said Dorothy Soule, research professor of marine biology at USC and a longtime specialist in the coastal effects of oil.

No one can say exactly how many birds will die, especially during migration season when thousands of birds are swooping along the coast. Some experts believe that the birds rescued in an oil spill amount to only 10% or 20% of all the birds harmed.

As some birds leave the Wintersburg channel and Bolsa Chica, others replace them. While the bulk of oil cleanup is done, one wildlife specialist inspecting the channel Friday saw oil lingering just inland from an earthen berm, with two great blue herons nearby.

“There’s still exposure going on,” said Carol Roberts, contaminants expert with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Both oiled and dead birds have been brought to the Wetlands and Wildlife Care Center in Huntington Beach, one of 23 centers statewide that are part of the statewide care network. There, veterinarians, rehabilitators and volunteers have struggled to save them. Some recovering birds may be released Monday on the shores of Newport Bay. But other fouled birds have eluded capture, such as the fast-moving egrets and herons that Napoli saw nearly a week ago. And while some California brown pelicans have been oiled, none have been caught.

Some dead birds have shown signs of being gnawed on by predators--perhaps turkey vultures, red-tailed hawks, coyotes, possums or rats. That means oil may rub off on the scavenging birds’ feathers, or sicken a feeding mammal, Roberts said.

She is concerned the oil could harm the small creatures eaten by Bolsa’s birds--the mussels clinging to rocks, mud-dwelling worms, crabs burrowing in and out of mud that may have been tainted by oil. Many tiny fish spend their entire lives in the wetlands, and their gills could be fouled. And if the mud is contaminated, mud-burrowing insects could die.

Many questions remain unanswered about the long-term effects of oil in wetlands, although scientific study has intensified since the mammoth 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster and the 1990 American Trader spill. At UC Davis, Anderson used markers or radios to track brown pelicans injured by two oil spills. Two years later, he could locate only 10%, compared to 53% of pelicans who were not exposed to the spills.

Bolsa Chica may become a laboratory for more study. Late this week, state experts roamed the shores of Bolsa Chica, collecting mussels and water samples for laboratory work. But it remains unclear if contamination lingers in the mud flats. Nor do experts know exactly how far the oil penetrated into Inner and Outer Bay, although most is believed to have been trapped by temporary booms placed in the channel.

Some scientists commended the Coast Guard and Fish and Game for reacting quickly to the spill. In fact, the response highlighted some improvements made after the Exxon Valdez and American Trader disasters.

The state of California created its Office of Oil Spill Prevention and Response in 1993, along with the wildlife care system known as the Oiled Wildlife Care Network. In the past, oiled birds might have sat in the wilds for days without being rescued.

“Those animals were much farther gone than they are today,” Mazet said. “Now we have trained professionals.”

But there are always lessons to be learned--and the damage caused last week at Bolsa Chica may lead to new studies.

“There’s a big spinoff on a little bit of oil,” said Soule at USC. “In the wetlands, it’s very serious business.”

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How Oil Affects Wildlife

The oil spill at Bolsa Chica involved only an estimated 100 to 200 gallons of waste oil and solvents, but it fouled a channel emptying into one of Southern California’s most popular gathering spots for birds. The full effects of the spill may never be known, but scientists say many kinds of wildlife could be weakened or killed when coastal wetlands are fouled by oil:

* Birds. Oiled feathers break down ability to stay dry and regulate body temperature. Birds preen to clean feathers swallowing oil.

* Invertebrates, mussels, snails. Some of these creatures could die from their exposure to the oil, meaning less food for birds at a time when Bolsa Chica is crowded with migrants from the north.

* Predatory birds and mammals. Dead Oil-slicked birds may be eaten by predatory birds and mammals like coyotes. These predators can be weakened or killed by swallowing oil if the dose is potent enough.

* Insects. Breathing ability could be damaged by oil, limiting food for birds.

* Fish. Oil slicks can reduce oxygen in water that fish need. Bottom-feeders could eat contaminated prey.

Source: State Dept. of Fish and Game, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, UC Davis, University of Southern California

Bird Toll

The Bolsa Chica oil spill may have harmed several hundred birds, but many may have moved along the coast or died without being found. As of late Saturday, 32 birds were being cared for at a Huntington Beach wildlife center, and 45 had either died at the center or were found dead.

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Bird Being treated Known dead Ruddy ducks 6 3 Pied-billed grebes 1 14 Eared grebes 1 Bufflehead ducks 1 4 Coots 21 12 Black-crowned night heron 1 Merganser ducks 2 Black-necked stilt 2 Pintail ducks 1 Mallard ducks 3 Cormorants 1 California gull 1 Western grebes 3 TOTAL 32 45

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Graphics reporting by DEBORAH SCHOCH/Los Angeles Times

SOURCE: Oiled Wildlife Care Network

Bird Calls

Where to call about oil spills:

* If you have information about the cause of the Bolsa Chica spill, call the state Department of Fish and Game’s toll-free “Cal-Tip” line, (888) 334-2258.

* To report an oil spill, contact the U.S. Coast Guard at (800) 221-8724 or the state Office of Emergency Services at (800) OILS-911.

* To report an oiled bird, call the “Cal-Tip” line or the Wetlands and Wildlife Care Center in Huntington Beach, (714) 374-5587.

* To volunteer time to help birds, contact the Wetlands and Wildlife Care Center at (714) 374-5587.