Stefan and I surfed at Pools yesterday and I got my inaugural sea urchin in the foot. Sea urchins are probably the biggest hazard when it comes to surfing in Puerto Rico. The little bastards are everywhere. Almost every good surf break is reef and where there is reef, there are urchins. Thousands of them. If you don’t know exactly where to get in and out of the water, you will definately step on a sea urchin. Even if you do know the beach well, you’ll end up with an urchin in your foot from time to time. I have not talked to a surfer here that has not had an experiance with sea urchin in their hands or feet.
Sea urchins (or Uni, in sushi terms) are spiny little echinoderms and are somewhat related to starfish and sea cucumbers. They concregrate all over the reef and a light touch will send the spines shooting into your foot (or hand, or whatever body part was unlucky enought to brush by an urchin), as a means of defense. It doesn’t really hurt when you step on a sea urchin, because the spines also have some sort of numbing agent. I didn’t even know that I stepped on one until I was out in the line up and started to think that my big toe felt a little numb. I took a look and saw a couple of spines hanging out of my toe. Bummer.
How to deal with an urchin in your foot depends on who you ask. I’ve been told to drip candle wax on it and the spines will back out into the wax due to the heat (I tried that, it didn’t work). I’ve been told to pour peroxide on it and forget about it. I’ve also been told to dig the spines out of my foot with tweezers. I ended up digging out the big one and leaving the little tiny spines.
Just goes to show, how different surfing hazards are depending on where you are surfing. In California we had to worry about stingrays and sharks, which are a bit more hazardous then an annoying urchin. Apparently Puerto Rico does not have sharks, so I guess that’s a decent trade off!
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Yeah, aside from all the body boarders, urchins are the most annoying thing in the water when you are surfing / snorkeling in Puerto Rico.
Once you get to know the in / out spots at all of the surf breaks, your odds of getting urchins in your feet drop big time. Although, with that said, my second session at pools (chest to head high glassy barrels with one other guy surfing the peak with me) my leash broke and my board washed into the cliffs on the inside. I had to swim in there and get my board which was floating in about 2-4 inches of water, smashing into the reef every time white water would push through. My hand brushed the bottom once and I got a few urchin spines in my finger.
I guess that is one of the reasons everyone was surfing the next peak down.
Urchins are a major pain in the ass here (figuratively of course). I have a few circular scars on my feet from stepping in them over the summer. As for sharks, there are, but not many. The reef tends to keep them away, so when a shark does make its way in, it’s big news. However, I try to scuba dive every weekend, and I’ve yet to ever see a shark in PR waters. I’ve seen a few turtles, rays, TONS of reef fish, and even a few barracuda- but no sharks.
Dianne stepped on an urchin at San-o and her boss recommended that she soak her foot in urine. So.. I pee’d on it for her and also pee’d in a little tub so she could soak her foot in it. We are not sure if it worked but it was kind of hot in a cleveland steamer sort of way.
There are some sharks in our waters but mainly out by Desacheo, Mona and Monito Islands.
[…] starting picking up last week with some small chest to head high real shallow surf (over reef; see Urchin Attack) but yesterday was a couple feet, offshore and lined up on the Caribbean side. I didn’t have […]