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Seahurst Park
 SW Seahurst Park Rd, Seattle, WA 98166
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Entry Type: Shore
Bottom Composition: Sand
Aquatic Life: Might See Something
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Rating: 3.00 by 2 divers
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Seahurst Park is a shore accessible salt water dive site, located at SW Seahurst Park Rd, Seattle, WA 98166. This dive site has an average rating of 3.00 out of 5 from 2 scuba divers.
Have to swim out far to dive deep but its very nice place to see at 15 feet their is flounder starfish what I’ve seen so far snorkeling out too look at how far you have to swim out to dive deep.
Seahurst
Park
Location:
Ed Munro Seahurst Park is located south of Seattle in Burien north of
Three Tree Point.
Description: The long sandy-cobblestone beach at the park
provides easy entry into the water. Once in the water, you’ll find
minimal currents along with a sunken barge and an interesting
community of colorful animals. Where a stream crosses the beach,
you’ll find a gradually sloping sandy bottom with an eelgrass bed.
North of the eelgrass, the bottom slopes downward past 90 feet. Access
hours are 8 a.m. to dusk. The park has restrooms, changing areas,
picnic shelters and hiking trails.
Seahurst Park is a beautiful, quite park located in Burien, just north of Three Tree Point (about 10 miles south of Seattle). There are excellent
facilities here, although parking can be very limited on nice warm sunny
days. The park is open from dawn to dusk, so there is no shore-based night
diving here (with all the bio-luminescent Seapens here, that’s a shame!)
Another nice feature about this site, in addition to the facilities, is that
currents here are much less intense than at many other sites. As Seahurst is
located on a relatively wide portion of Puget Sound, it is less subject to
heavy water movement.
Most of the bottom at Seahurst is muddy, and offers little slope. In fact,
you have to swim a ways to get to 50 fsw. There is an old decayed wooden
barge at this site that you can find by lining up the two pilings of the
"donut" sculpture (don’t ask, you will know it when you see it), taking a
compass bearing on this line, then following this line out to about 45 fsw.
If you get to 50 fsw and haven’t seen the barge, you have missed it. The
barge looks more like a mound of wood debris and silt than a barge, with
metal fixtures sticking a foot or two out of the muck. Be careful of the
metal fixture as they will easily snag any dangling scuba gear.
Marine life on the barge can vary greatly. Sun Anemones and Swimming
Anemones dot the barge with where ever they can establish a foothold. I have
been here when there is very little marine life, and other times I have
found Red Octopus, Dogfish, Ratfish, flounder, small rockfish, Kelp and Painted Greenlings, Striped Sea Perch, and Shiner Perch. The main attraction
to me, however, are the nudibranchs. The biggest Pink and Alabaster
Nudibranchs I have ever seen have been at this site (Pink’s as big as 10").
I have also found many other varieties of nudibranchs here, including Stripe. and Aeolidia Papillosa. It appears as if the nudibranch
population and varieties vary greatly from season to season.
One of the cool things about this site is the vast number of Seapens that
call this mud flat home (which would explain the oversized Seapen eating
nudibranchs!) In the spring and summer, there are literally thousands of
orange Seapens basking in the light currents. Also on the flats you may see
Dungeness, Red Rock, and Hermit Crabs (some rather large), an occasional Big
Skate, and more flounder and sole than you know what to do with.