Monthly Archives: August 2010

Sociological profiles help decision makers understand coastal towns

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Fish processors take a breakA three-year effort to flesh out existing dollars-and-cents data about coastal fishing communities with sociological information about how fishing affects community life is paying off in broader awareness by resource managers and industry of the social and economic culture of three coastal Oregon towns.

The project, initiated by the fishing community and Oregon Sea Grant with support from NOAA Fisheries and the Oregon State University Sustainable Rural Communities Initiative, has generated the first-ever “long-form” sociological profiles of the communities of Garibaldi, Newport and Port Orford. Other coastal towns are expressing interest in developing profiles of their own.

The fishing industry employs thousands of Oregonians and generated $105 million in fish-landed value in 2009 alone. In 2007, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) published “short-form” economic profiles attempting to describe how specific communities benefit from fishing.

“The NOAA profiles area useful step in the right direction, but limited in scope,” said Flaxen Conway, Oregon Sea Grant’s Extension community outreach specialist and a professor of Sociology at OSU. “These long form profiles provide a more detailed, rich description of this socially, culturally, and economically-important industry,” she said.

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Sea Grant director to blog Gulf research cruise

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Stephen Brandt, director of Oregon Sea Grant, embarks tomorrow on a week-long research cruise attempting to map and quantify the effects of this summer’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill on the marine ecology of the northern Gulf of Mexico.

The cruise, supported by a National Science Foundation rapid-response grant, includes scientific collaborators from Oregon State University, the University of Maryland and Eastern Carolina University. The scientists will be building on data they’ve collected from the same region in seven years of research cruises there.

Time and shipboard Internet connections permitting, they intend to blog about the experience at http://blogs.oregonstate.edu/sciencefromthespill/

Read more about the research

Sea Grant Summer Scholars sought science experience

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Summer Scholars visit fish disease labCORVALLIS, Ore. – Asked what he learned this summer, Ian Heller said, “Time and tide wait for no man.” With anyone else, it’d be a tired cliché, but with Heller, a student working with the Environmental Protection Agency, the lesson was personal and he was the one who was tired, waking at 5:30 a.m. most mornings.

Heller and fellow EPA student-worker Phillip Sanchez started crewing early mornings on small boats that pulled trawl nets through the Yaquina and Alsea marshes. The trawls would reveal how the estuaries are used by fish species that are economically important to Oregon.

Heller, a senior at Vassar College in New York, and Sanchez, a recent graduate of University of Florida, are two of the five “Summer Scholars” in a new program directed by Oregon Sea Grant at Oregon State University. The 10-week program gives undergraduates a taste of working in marine science, policy, and management by pairing them with mentors in federal, state and local agencies.

Over the summer, the students conducted research and analyses in the natural and social sciences, education and outreach, and policy. They helped agencies with their existing work and gained an understanding for what it is like to work in the public sector. The students wrote weekly reflections in which they discussed their previous week, challenges they faced, how they overcame them, and their plan for the following week.

According to Julie Risien, program organizer with Sea Grant, “the general idea was to expose students to working in marine science and policy in the public sector – what is it like to work for a government agency? What do agencies do? What is their role in marine science or monitoring, or in setting, implementing, and evaluating marine policies?”

Rain Garden Guide helping Oregonians manage stormwater

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Oregon Rain Garden GuideCORVALLIS, Ore. – If you have a lemon, make lemonade. In Oregon, if you have excess rainwater, make a rain garden.

The Oregon Rain Garden Guide, produced by Oregon Sea Grant at Oregon State University, is the state’s first stormwater management resource for both novices and expert landscapers. An increasing number of Oregonians are disconnecting downspouts, building rain collection barrels and planting rain gardens to harvest water from their businesses, schools and front yards, according to co-author Robert Emanuel, an Oregon Sea Grant Extension specialist.

Rain gardens are sunken beds that absorb and treat stormwater runoff from rooftops, driveways and other paved surfaces. Runoff does not soak into the ground; instead it flows directly into sewers and surface waterways, such as streams or lakes. Landscaped rain gardens intercept runoff to reduce floods, recharge drinking water – and filter oil, garden chemicals and other pollutants. Rain gardens also provide wildlife habitat.

The need for an uncomplicated, step-by-step guide for stormwater management motivated Emanuel and a team of experts. “We needed a book, something polished, that our workshop participants could take into the field,” said Emanuel.

In the past year, Emanuel and Sea Grant Extension colleague Derek Godwin have helped coordinate about 20 “Stormwater Solutions” workshops around Oregon, from the southern coast to Portland. Builders, developers, civil engineers, city planners and other land development professionals learn from case studies about permits, site design and costs. The techniques and plants described by the guide are showcased in demonstration sites at churches, parks, private homes, businesses and even a day care center.

Search for partnerships/innovation leader expanded

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Oregon Sea Grant is expanding its search for qualified applicants for a new Strategic Partnerships and Innovation Leader position to include candidates from around the US.

The new position is a full-time (1.0 FTE), 12-month, fixed-term appointment. The successful candidate will develop and lead Oregon Sea Grant’s co competitive research, strategic partnerships and innovation portfolio, including managing our biennial marine research grant competition, cultivating partnership opportunities and nurturing relationships for program development, growth and funding.

Candidates should have a PhD with 3 years minimum successful experience in a similar position (or Masters with at least 7 years of experience in program development in the aquatic sciences or policy arena) with a background emphasis in marine science, aquatic environmental science or marine policy or socioeconomics, ora  related field. Candidates should demonstrate:

  • Strong working knowledge of university research and scholarship
  • Proven ability to actively seek out opportunities for investment, revenue generation and strategic partnerships
  • Proven track record of writing successful multi-partner grant proposals of large proportion

The new position will be based in the Oregon Sea Grant office on the campus of Oregon State University, in Corvallis.

For a full position description and application material, visit the  OSU Jobs site

New Podcast Interview about climate change and cultural values

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We all have preferences about how society should be ordered, and whether we believe in hierarchy and individualism or are egalitarian and value community, those cultural values shape our reception to science and communication about science. Listen to a two-part interview with Dan Kahan of Yale Law School, conducted by Joe Cone of Oregon Sea Grant, part of Communicating Climate Change, a series of discussions intended primarily for those serious about doing just that.

Bounty offered for returned crab tags

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Dungeness crabNEWPORT – Oregon Sea Grant is asking crab fishermen to keep a watchful eye out for Dungeness crabs with tags on their legs – and to forward any tags they’ve collected to the program by Sept. 1.

The Oregon State University-based program, along with the Oregon Wave Energy Trust and the Oregon Dungeness Crab Commission, have been conducting a study on the movement of Dungeness crabs along the Oregon Coast. Scientists tagged 3,000 legal sized male crabs in October and November of 2009. Tags were placed on the back right legs of legal sized male Dungeness crabs.

Dungeness crab fishermen from both the commercial and recreational fleets have been returning tags since December. More than 800 tags have already been returned, and the researchers are hoping to wrap up the study. Rewards of $20 for each tag will be given for all tags returned before September 1st, 2010. The project will also hold a drawing in early September for $1,000.

“If you have a tag, please return it as soon as possible to claim your reward,” said Kaety Hildenbrand, Oregon Sea Grant Extension agent in Newport, who is helping coordinate the tag collection.

To return a tag:

Remove the tag from the crab and write down:

  • Location, depth and date the crab was found
  • Tag number
  • Your name, address, phone number
  • Your signature

Mail this information and the tag to:

Oregon Dungeness Crab Study
29 SE 2nd Street
Newport, OR 97365

Glowing shrimp? Not to worry, say Sea Grant specialists

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NEWPORT, Ore. – Some Oregonians who recently purchased pink shrimp at the coast or at large retail stores have called Oregon State University’s Lincoln County Extension Office over the past few days to report a rather unusual trait.

Their seafood was glowing in the dark.

What sounds other-worldly is actually surprisingly common, according to Kaety Hildenbrand, an OSU Sea Grant Extension specialist who works with coastal fishing communities. Marine bacteria can cause glowing or luminescence when they grow on seafood products – a trait that may be exacerbated by the adding of salt during processing.

The important thing to remember, she said, is that “glowing” seafood does not present a food safety problem, nor does it reflect mishandling during processing.

(Read more)

1998 US FDA report on glowing seafood

Sea Grant Summer Scholars present their work

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Oregon Sea Grant’s first class of undergraduate Summer Scholars will present their projects and research in an August 11 symposium at the Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport.

The symposium runs from 1 to 3 pm in the Guin Library Seminar Room.

Sea Grant’s Summer Scholars program, launched this year, provides undergraduates with hands-on experience and training in marine science and resource management. Students are placed with Oregon resource agencies for the summer, assigned to specific research or outreach programs, and trained in subjects such as ecosystem-based management, professional and scientific communication, field-based scientific methods, natural resource policy development, and roles of federal, state and local governments in natural resource management.

The scholars who will be presenting their work on Aug. 11 are:

  • AnnaRose Adams, Oregon State University, assigned to the Oregon Sea Grant program office on the OSU campus, under the mentorship of program director Steve Brandt and Julie Risien.
  • Daniel Brusa, SUNY-Rockland Community College, New York, who is assigned to the Lincoln County Sea Grant Extention team in Newport, under the mentorship of Extension faculty member Kaety Hildenbrand.
  • Ian Heller, Vassar College, New York, assigned to the US Environmental Protection Agency’s West Coast Ecology Division at the Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport, under the mentorship of Ted Dewitt.
  • Phillip Sanchez, University of Florida-Gainesville, assigned to the US Environmental Protection Agency’s West Coast Ecology Division at the Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport, under the mentorship of Jim Power.
  • Katie Wrubel, California State University-Monterey Bay, assigned to the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife’s Charleston office, under the mentorship of Scott Groth.