Cattlewash, Barbados tide times

Predictions: Open-Meteo Marine (MeteoFrance SMOC, 0.08° grid) — heights relative to MSL (not chart datum / LAT). Model-derived.

Model-derived from a global ocean grid. Useful indication; expect about ±45 minutes on average vs. a local harmonic gauge, individual stations vary widely. See /methodology for per-region detail. Not for navigation.

Conditions as of 00:00 local time. Refreshes daily.

Predictions: Open-Meteo Marine (MeteoFrance SMOC, 0.08° grid) — heights relative to MSL (not chart datum / LAT). Model-derived. · Not for navigation.

The angler tradition for major/minor fishing windows: major ≈3-hour windows around moon transit and opposition; minor ≈2-hour windows around moonrise and moonset. Times are America/Barbados local. Folk tradition, not a scientific forecast.

Last spring tide on Mon 18 May (range 0.9m). Next neap on Fri 22 May.

Spring tides cluster around new and full moons (biggest swings). Neap tides land on quarter moons (smallest swings). See the spring tide and neap tide glossary entries for the why.

Cattlewash is roughly 3 km north of Bathsheba on the same Atlantic-facing east coast road, and where Bathsheba has its surf break and day-trippers, Cattlewash has mostly beach, sky, and the sound of the Atlantic trades. The name comes from the practice of driving cattle down to the shoreline to wash them in the sea — a custom that has disappeared but left its record in the place name. The beach is wide, the sand is coarser than the west coast's calm-water coral sand, and the water is rough enough that signage at various points along the east coast warns that swimming is for strong and experienced swimmers only. That warning is real. The combination of rip currents, shore dump at certain tide states, and Atlantic swell sets at 10 to 14 seconds means the water at Cattlewash rewards respect. The more practical pursuits here are walking the beach at low water, photography in the morning light, and turtle watching in season. Hawksbill turtles nest along the Cattlewash and Bathsheba beaches from around May through October. The Barbados Sea Turtle Project monitors nest sites along the east coast; nesting activity peaks in July and August, and hatchlings emerge typically 60 to 65 days after laying. Disturbing nests or using artificial light on the beach at night during nesting season is illegal under Barbados law. The flat stretch of beach at low water — typically 20 to 30 metres wider on a spring low than at high water — is the main access window for walkers and shell collectors. The tidal window for the widest beach is the 90-minute bracket either side of low water on a spring tide day, when the predicted range runs closer to 0.7 to 0.8 metres. Morning light at Cattlewash arrives directly off the Atlantic, and the low-angle golden hour before 07:00 in the dry season illuminates the beach diagonally, with the low dunes and casuarina pines providing the background. For anglers, the shore-casting window on the flood tide — particularly the first two hours of the incoming — is the traditional period for jack and snapper along the rock ledges at the north end of the beach. The coral rubble zone just past the beach's southern end toward Bathsheba holds lionfish in the deeper crevices; the Barbados Fisheries Division runs a periodic culling programme on the east coast. The tidal regime at Cattlewash is the same as at Bathsheba: mixed semidiurnal, spring range roughly 0.6 to 0.8 metres, governed in practice more by the Atlantic swell state than by the astronomical prediction. All tide predictions come from Open-Meteo Marine gridded model — accuracy within plus or minus 45 minutes on timing and 0.2 to 0.3 metres on height. The Barbados Meteorological Services swell forecast should be checked before any entry into the water.