The sea has gone the color of old silver, its surface as smooth as a wave-worn shell. It’s an hour before dawn on this −12°C (10°F) day in January at Rhode Island’s Beavertail State Park, a 153-acre rocky promontory shaped like a beaver’s tail. Beavertail juts out from the southern end of Conanicut Island into Narragansett Bay and the Atlantic Ocean beyond.

Dybas, C.L. 2016. Ripple marks—The story behind the story. Oceanography 29(1):8–11, https://doi.org/10.5670/oceanog.2016.23.

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