zooplankton – Page 2 – Geospatial Ecology of Marine Megafauna Laboratory

Introducing the Theyodelers – the Port Orford Gray Whale Foraging Ecology Team of 2020

By Lisa Hildebrand, MSc student, OSU Department of Fisheries & Wildlife, Marine Mammal Institute, Geospatial Ecology of Marine Megafauna Lab

Yodel-Ay-Ee-Ooooo! Hello from the Theyodelers, this year’s Port Orford gray whale foraging ecology field team. In case you were wondering, no, we aren’t hobby yodelers and we don’t plan on becoming them. The team name this year actually has to be attributed to a parent of one of my interns. Shout out to Scott Holt who during the first week of the field season asked his daughter Mattea (our OSU undergraduate intern) whether using a theodolite (the instrument we use to track gray whales from our cliff site) is anything like yodeling. The name was an immediate hit with the team and so the team name discussion was closed fairly early on in the season. Now that I have explained our slightly unconventional team name, let me tell you a little about this year’s team and what has been going on down here on the Oregon south coast so far.

As you can tell from the byline, I (Lisa) am back as the project’s team lead in this, the 6^th year of the Port Orford gray whale research and internship project. Going into this year’s field season with two years of experience under my belt has made me feel more confident and comfortable with diving straight back into our fine-scale research with a new team of interns. Yet, I am beginning to realize that no matter how much experience I have, there will always be unforeseeable curve balls thrown at me that I can’t anticipate no matter how prepared or experienced I am. However, my knowledge and experience now certainly inform how I tackle these curve balls and hopefully allow my problem-solving to be better and quicker. I am so thrilled that Leigh and I were able to get the field season approved here in Port Orford despite the ongoing pandemic. There were many steps we had to take and protocols to write and get approved, but it was worth the work. It certainly is strange living in a place that is meant to be your home for six weeks but having to wear a face covering everywhere except your own bedroom. However, mask wearing, frequent hand washing, and disinfecting is a very small price to pay to avoid having a lapse in our gray whale data collected here in Port Orford (and minimize transmission). Doing field research amidst COVID has certainly been a big curve ball this year but, so far, I have been able to handle these added challenges pretty well, especially with a lot of help from my team. Speaking of which, time to introduce the other Theyodelers…

Figure 1. Noah watching and waiting for whales on the cliff. When we are outside in the wind and are able to maintain a minimum 6-ft distance, we are able to remove our face coverings. Source: T. McCambridge.

First up, we have Noah Dolinajec. Noah is a fellow graduate student who is currently doing a Master’s in Marine & Lacustrine Science and Management at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel in Brussels, Belgium. While he is attending graduate school in Belgium, Noah is not actually from this European country. In fact, he is a Portlandian! As an Oregonian with a passion for the marine environment, Noah is no stranger to the Oregon coast and has spent quite some time exploring it in the past. Some other things about Noah: before going to college he played semi-professional ice hockey, he is a bit of a birder, and he likes to cook (he and I have been tag-teaming the team cooking this year).

*Figure 2. Mattea outside the field station holding local fisher-pup Jim.* *Source: L. Hildebrand.*

Next, we have Mattea Holt Colberg. As I mentioned before, Mattea is the team’s OSU undergraduate intern this year. By participating in a running-start program at her high school where she took two years of college classes, Mattea entered OSU as a junior at just 18 years old! However, she has decided to somewhat extend her undergraduate career at OSU by completing a dual major in Biology and Music. She plays the piano and the violin (which she brought to Port Orford, but we have yet to be serenaded by her). Mattea has previously conducted field research on killer whales in the Salish Sea and I can tell that she is hoping for killer whales to show up in Port Orford (while not entirely ludicrous, the chance of this happening is probably very, very slim).

*Figure 3. Liz in the bow of the kayak in Tichenor Cove.* *Source: L. Hildebrand.*

Last but certainly not least, is Liz Kelly, our Pacific High School intern from Port Orford. Liz has lived in several different states across the country (I’m talking Kentucky to Florida) and so I am really excited that she currently lives here in Oregon because she has been an absolute joy to have on the team so far. Liz brings a lot of energy and humor to the team, which we have certainly needed whenever those curve balls come flying. Besides her positivity, Liz brings a lot of determination and perseverance and seeing her work through tough situations here already has made me very proud. I really hope this internship provides Liz with the life, STEM, and communication skills she needs to help her succeed in pursuing her goals of doing wildlife research after college. As you may have read in my last blog, our previous high school interns have had successes in being admitted to various colleges to follow their goals, and I feel confident that Liz will be no different. When she is not here at the field station, she can probably be found taking care of and riding one of her four horses (Millie, Maricja, Miera, and Jeanie).

Now that I have introduced the 2020 field team, here is a short play-by-play of what we have been seeing, or perhaps more aptly, not seeing. Our whale sighting numbers have been pretty low so far and when we do see them, they seem to be foraging a little further away from our study site than I am used to seeing in past years. However, this shift in behavior is not entirely surprising to me since our zooplankton net has been coming up pretty empty at our sampling stations. While there are mysids and amphipods scattered here and there, their numbers are in the low 10s when we do our zooplankton ID lab work in the afternoons. These low counts are also reflected by the low densities I am anecdotally seeing on our GoPro drops (Fig 4).

Figure 4. Comparison of zooplankton density from our GoPro videos. Both images were taken at the same sampling station (Tichenor Cove 8), however the image on the left that contains a lot of little critters is from 2018, whereas the image on the right is from last week. This year our drops have been looking more like the image on the right, though typically with even fewer zooplankton.

While I am not entirely certain why we are seeing this low prey abundance, I do have some hypotheses. The most likely reason is that this year we experienced some delayed upwelling on our coast. Dawn wrote a great blog about upwelling and wind a few weeks ago and I suggest checking it out to better understand what upwelling is and how it can affect whales (and the whole ecosystem). Typically, we see our peak upwelling occur here in Oregon in May-June. However, if you look at Figure 5 you will see that both the indices remained low at that time this year, whereas in previous years, they were already increasing by May/June.

Figure 5. 10 year time series of the Coastal Upwelling Transport Index (CUTI; top plot) and Biologically Effective Upwelling Transport Index (BEUTI; bottom plot) at 44ºN. CUTI represents the amount of upwelling (positive numbers) or downwelling (negative numbers) while BEUTI estimates the amount of nitrate (i.e. nutrients) upwelled (positive numbers) and downwelled (negative numbers). The light-colored lines represent *the CUTI and BEUTI at that point in time while the dark, bold lines represent the long-term average.*

A delayed upwelling means that there was likely less nutrients in the water to support little critters like zooplankton to start reproducing and increasing their abundances. Simply put, it means our coastal waters appear to be less productive than they usually are at this time of the year. If there is not much prey around (as we have been finding in our two study sites – Mill Rocks and Tichenor Cove), then it makes sense to me why gray whales are not hanging around since there is not much to feed on. Fortunately, the tail of the trend line in Figure 5 is angling upward, which means that the upwelling finally started in June so hopefully the nutrients, zooplankton and whales will follow soon too. In fact, since I wrote the draft of this blog at the end of last week, we have actually seen an increase in the numbers of mysids in our zooplankton net and on our GoPro videos.

We are almost halfway done with the field season already and I cannot believe how quickly it goes by! During the first two weeks we were busy getting familiar with all of our gear and completing First Aid/CPR and kayak paddle & rescue courses. This week the team started the real data collection. We have had some hiccups (we lost our GoPro stick and our backup GoPro stick, but thankfully have already recovered one of them) but overall, we are off to a pretty good start. Now we just need the upwelling to really kick in, for there to be thick layers of mysids, and for the whales to come in close. Over the next three weeks, you will be hearing from Noah, Mattea and Liz as they share their experiences and viewpoints with all of you!

You can’t build a pyramid without the base: diving into the foundations of behavioral ecology to understand cetacean foraging

By Lisa Hildebrand, MSc student, OSU Department of Fisheries & Wildlife, Marine Mammal Institute, Geospatial Ecology of Marine Megafauna Lab

The last two months have been challenging for everyone across the world. While I have also experienced lows and disappointments during this time, I always try to see the positives and to appreciate the good things every day, even if they are small. One thing that I have been extremely grateful and excited about every week is when the clock strikes 9:58 am every Thursday. At that time, I click a Zoom link and after a few seconds of waiting, I am greeted by the smiling faces of the GEMM Lab. This spring term, our Principal Investigator Dr. Leigh Torres is teaching a reading and conference class entitled ‘Cetacean Behavioral Ecology’. Every week there are 2-3 readings (a mix of book chapters and scientific papers) focused on a particular aspect of behavioral ecology in cetaceans. During the first week we took a deep dive into the foundations of behavioral ecology (much of which is terrestrial-based) and we have now transitioned into applying the theories to more cetacean-centric literature, with a different branch of behavior and ecology addressed each week.

Leigh dedicated four weeks of the class to discussing foraging behavior, which is particularly relevant (and exciting) to me since my Master’s thesis focuses on the fine-scale foraging ecology of gray whales. Trying to understand the foraging behavior of cetaceans is not an easy feat since there are so many variables that influence the decisions made by an individual on where and when to forage, and what to forage on. While we can attempt to measure these variables (e.g., prey, environment, disturbance, competition, an individual’s health), it is almost impossible to quantify all of them at the same time while also tracking the behavior of the individual of interest. Time, money, and unworkable weather conditions are the typical culprits of making such work difficult. However, on top of these barriers is the added complication of scale. We still know so little about the scales at which cetaceans operate on, or, more importantly, the scales at which the aforementioned variables have an effect on and drive the behavior of cetaceans. For instance, does it matter if a predator is 10 km away, or just when it is 1 km away? Is a whale able to sense a patch of prey 100 m away, or just 10 m away? The same questions can be asked in terms of temporal scale too.

*What is that gray whale doing in the kelp? Source: F. Sullivan.*

As such, cetacean field work will always involve some compromise in data collection between these factors. A project might address cetacean movements across large swaths of the ocean (e.g., the entire U.S. west coast) to locate foraging hotspots, but it would be logistically complicated to simultaneously collect data on prey distribution and abundance, disturbance and competitors across this same scale at the same time. Alternatively, a project could focus on a small, fixed area, making simultaneous measurements of multiple variables more feasible, but this means that only individuals using the study area are studied. My field work in Port Orford falls into the latter category. The project is unique in that we have high-resolution data on prey (zooplankton) and predators (gray whales), and that these datasets have high spatial and temporal overlap (collected at nearly the same time and place). However, once a whale leaves the study area, I do not know where it goes and what it does once it leaves. As I said, it is a game of compromises and trade-offs.

Ironically, the species and systems that we study also live a life of compromises and trade-offs. In one of this week’s readings, Mridula Srinivasan very eloquently starts her chapter entitled ‘Predator/Prey Decisions and the Ecology of Fear’ in Bernd Würsig’s ‘Ethology and Behavioral Ecology of Odontocetes’ with the following two sentences: “Animal behaviors are governed by the intrinsic need to survive and reproduce. Even when sophisticated predators and prey are involved, these tenets of behavioral ecology hold.”. Every day, animals must walk the tightrope of finding and consuming enough food to survive and ensure a level of fitness required to reproduce, while concurrently making sure that they do not fall prey to a predator themselves. Krebs & Davies (2012) very ingeniously use the idea of economic analysis of costs and benefits to understand foraging behavior (but also behavior in general). While foraging, individuals not only have to assess potential risk (Fig. 1) but also decide whether a certain prey patch or item is profitable enough to invest energy into obtaining it (Fig. 2).

Leigh’s class has been great, not only to learn about foundational theories but to then also apply them to each of our study species and systems. It has been exciting to construct hypotheses based on the readings and then dissect them as a group. As an example, Sih’s 1984 paper on the behavioral response race of predators and prey prompted a discussion on responses of predators and prey to one another and how this affects their spatial distributions. Sih posits that since predators target areas with high prey densities, and prey will therefore avoid areas that predators frequent, their responses are in conflict with one another. Resultantly, there will be different outcomes depending on whichever response dominates. If the predator’s response dominates (i.e. predators are able to seek out areas of high prey density before prey can respond), then predators and prey will have positively correlated spatial distributions. However, if the prey responses dominate, then the spatial distributions of the two should be negatively correlated, as predators will essentially always be ‘one step behind’ the prey. Movement is most often the determinant factor to describe the strength of these relationships.

Video 1. Zooplankton closest to the camera will jump or dart away from it. Source: GEMM Lab.

So, let us think about this for gray whales and their zooplankton prey. The latter are relatively immobile. Even though they dart around in the water column (I have seen them ‘jump’ away from the GoPro when we lower it from the kayak on several occasions; Video 1), they do not have the ability to maneuver away fast or far enough to evade a gray whale predator moving much faster. As such, the predator response will most likely always be the strongest since gray whales operate at a scale that is several orders of magnitude greater than the zooplankton. However, the zooplankton may not be as helpless as I have made them seem. Based on our field observations, it seems that zooplankton often aggregate beneath or around kelp. This behavior could potentially be an attempt to evade predators as the kelp and reef crevices may serve as a refuge. So, in areas with a lot of refuges, the prey response may in fact dominate the relationship between gray whales and zooplankton. This example demonstrates the importance of habitat in shaping predator-prey interactions and behavior. However, we have often observed gray whales perform “bubble blasts” in or near kelp (Video 2). We hypothesize that this behavior could be a foraging tactic to tip the see-saw of predator-prey response strength back into their favor. If this is the case, then I would imagine that gray whales must decide whether the energetic benefit of eating zooplankton hidden in kelp refuges outweighs the energy required to pursue them (Fig. 2). On top of all these choices, are the potential risks and threats of boat traffic, fishing gear, noise, and potential killer whale predation (Fig. 1). Bringing us back to the analogy of economic analysis of costs and benefits to predator-prey relationships. I never realized it so clearly before, but gray whales sure do have a lot of decisions to make in a day!

Video 2. Drone footage of a gray whale foraging in kelp and performing a “bubble blast” at 00:40. Footage captured under NMFS permit #21678. Source: GEMM Lab.

Trying to tease apart these nuanced dynamics is not easy when I am unable to simply ask my study subjects (gray whales) why they decided to abandon a patch of zooplankton (Were the zooplankton too hard to obtain because they sought refuge in kelp, or was the patch unprofitable because there were too few or the wrong kind of zooplankton?). Or, why do gray whales in Oregon risk foraging in such nearshore coastal reefs where there is high boat traffic (Does their need for food near the reefs outweigh this risk, or do they not perceive the boats as a risk?). So, instead, we must set up specific hypotheses and use these to construct a thought-out and informed study design to best answer our questions (Mann 2000). For the past few weeks, I have spent a lot of time familiarizing myself with spatial packages and functions in R to start investigating the relationships between zooplankton and kelp hidden in the data we have collected over 4 years, to ultimately relate these patterns to gray whale foraging. I still have a long and steep journey before I reach the peak but once I do, I hope to have answers to some of the questions that the Cetacean Behavioral Ecology class has inspired.

Literature cited

Krebs, J. R., and N. B. Davies. 2012. Economic decisions and the individual in Davies, N. B. et al., eds. An introduction to behavioral ecology. John Wiley & Sons, Oxford.

Mann, J. 2000. Unraveling the dynamics of social life: long-term studies and observational methods in Mann, J., ed. Cetacean societies: field studies of dolphins and whales. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.

Sih, A. 1984. The behavioral response race between predator and prey. The American Naturalist 123:143-150.

Srinivasan, M. 2019. Predator/prey decisions and the ecology of fear in Würsig, B., ed. Ethology and ecology of odontocetes. Springer Nature, Switzerland.

Intricacies of Zooplankton Species Identification

By Donovan Burns, Astoria High School Junior, GEMM Lab summer intern

The term zooplankton is used to describe a large number of creatures; the exact definition is any animal that cannot move against a sustained current in the marine environment. There are two main types of plankton: holoplankton and meroplankton. Meroplankton are organisms that are plankton for only part of their life cycle. So this makes most sea creatures plankton, for instance, salmon, sunfish, tuna, and most other fish are meroplankton because they start out their lives as plankton. Holoplankton are plankton that remain plankton for their whole lives, these include mysid shrimp, most marine worms, and most jellyfish.

I have spent a good deal of time this summer looking through a microscope at the zooplankton we have captured during sampling from our research kayak, trying to distinguish and identify different species. Telsons, the tail of the tail, are what we use to identify different types of mysid shrimp, which are a primary gray whale prey item along the Oregon coast and the most predominant type of zooplankton we capture in our sampling. For instance Neomysis is a genus of mysid shrimp and is one of the two most abundant zooplankton species we get. Their telsons end with two spikes that are somewhat longer than the spikes on the side of the telson. This look is distinct from Holmesimysis sculpta, the other of the two most abundant zooplankton species we get, which have four-pronged telsons with varying sizes of spikes along the sides of the telson. Alienacanthomysis macropsis is identified by both their long eye stalks and their rather bland rounded telson.

Holmesimysis sculpta
Neomysis
Alienacanthomysis macropsis

However, creatures that are not mysid shrimp cannot be identified this way. Like gammarids, they look like fleas. We have only found one kind of gammarid here in Port Orford this year, Atylus tridens. There are other types but that is the only type we have found this year. After that, we have Caprellidae, also known as skeleton shrimp. They are long and stalky, and have claws in every spot where they could have claws.

Then there are copepods. Copepods are tiny and have long antennae that string down to the sides of their bodies. We also have been seeing lots of crab larvae. I have also seen a couple of polychaete worms, which are marine worms with many legs and segments. The only reason I was able to identify them as polychaetes is due to my marine biology class at Astoria High School where we identified these worms using microscopes before.

We also have had some trouble identifying somethings. For instance, we have found a few individuals of a type of mysid shrimp with a rake-like tail that we are still trying to identify. Also, we have captured some jellyfish that we are not trying to identify. When the kayak team gets back in from gathering samples, we freeze the samples to kill and preserve the critters in them. This process turns the jellyfish to mush, so they are hard to identify.

Mystery mysid with rake-like tail.

To identify these zooplankton and other critters, we put them into a Petri dish and under a dissection scope, at which point we use forceps to move and pivot creatures. If a jellyfish had just eaten another plankton, we have to cut it open to get the plankton out so we can identify it.

Sometimes we have large samples of thousands of the same creature, in this case, we would normally sub-sample it. Sub-sampling is when we take a portion of a sample and identify and count individual zooplankton in that sub-sample. Then we multiply those counts by the portion of the whole sample to get the approximate total number that are in that sample. For instance, say we had a rather large sample, we would take a tenth of that sample and count what is in it. Say we count 500 individuals in that tenth. We would then multiply 500 by ten to get the total number in that whole sample.

Then there are some plankton that we do not catch, like large jellyfish. The kayak team has gotten photos of a giant jellyfish that was nearly a meter long.

Jellyfish seen by the kayak team. Source: L. Hildebrand.

All in all, Port Orford has an amazing and diverse population of marine life. From gray whales to thresher sharks to mysid shrimp to copepods to jellyfish, this little ecosystem has pretty much some of everything.

Plastics truly are ubiquitous in the marine environment

By Lisa Hildebrand, MSc student, OSU Department of Fisheries and Wildlife, Geospatial Ecology of Marine Megafauna Lab

As I enter my second term at OSU as a Master’s student, the ideas and structure of my thesis are slowly coming together. As of right now, my plan is to have two data chapters: The first chapter will assess the quality of zooplankton prey gray whales have access to along the Oregon coast, by looking at energetic value and microplastic content. I will contemplate about how my results potentially affect gray whale health. The second chapter will investigate fine-scale foraging and space use of gray whales in the Port Orford area to determine whether individual specialisation exists.

Fig 1. What it feels like when you start a literature review. Source: Harvard Blogs.

When I first started digging into the scientific literature to prepare for writing my thesis proposal (which is still underway but I’m getting close to the end of a first draft…), one sentence that I seemed to stumble across more often than not was “Marine plastics are ubiquitous” or “Plastics have become ubiquitous in the marine environment” or some other, very similar, iteration of that statement (e.g. Machovsky-Capuska et al. 2019; Eriksen et al. 2014; Fendall & Sewell 2009).

Many of the papers I first read were review papers on microplastics that mostly discussed general concepts like dispersal mechanisms, trophic transfer, or how microplastics become degraded. While I often think of review papers as treasure chests, since they neatly and succinctly summarise an often complicated and busy area of research into just a few pages, sometimes the fine-scale detail can go missing. Therefore, when reading these review papers, I wasn’t learning the in depth details about specific studies where microplastics had been detected in a group of individuals, population or species. So I felt the statement “Plastics are ubiquitous” was just a good (and pretty dramatic) opening line for a paper. However, once I delved into the studies on single species, I was overwhelmed by the amount of results that GoogleScholar spit out at me. If you type “microplastics marine” into the search bar, you’ll get about 7,650 results. This amount might not sound like a lot, especially if you compare it to say “gray whale”, which generates 96,600 results. Yet, the microplastic extraction method typically used was only developed in 2004 (Thompson et al. 2004). Hence, in a span of just 15 years, over 7,000 studies have detected microplastics in over 660 marine organisms (Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity 2012) – a fact I find extremely troubling.

Fig 2. Graphic explaining how plastics don’t go away. Source: Biotecnika.

Microplastics are most commonly viewed as particles <5 mm in size (though there is some contention on this size classification, e.g. Claessens et al. 2013). Microplastics arise from several sources, including fragmentation of larger plastics by UV photo-degradation, wave action and physical abrasion, loss of pre-production pellets (nurdles) and polystyrene beads from shipping vessels, waste water discharge containing microbeads used in cosmetics and microfibers released during the washing of textiles and run-off from land (Nelms et al. 2018). Their small size makes these persistent particles bioavailable to ingestion by a variety of marine taxa, ranging from small prey organisms such as zooplankton, to large megafauna such as whales.

Zooplankton are at the base of marine food webs and are therefore consumed in large quantities by a large number of consumers. The propensity of zooplankton to feed in surface waters makes them highly susceptible to encountering and ingesting microplastics as this is where these synthetic particles are highly abundant (Botterell et al. 2018). Microplastics have been detected in zooplankton from the Northeast Pacific Ocean (Desforges et al. 2015), northern South China Sea (Sun et al. 2017), and Portuguese coast (Frias et al. 2014). Additionally, there is documented overlap between microplastic and zooplankton occurrence at many more locations (e.g. North Western Mediterranean Sea, Collignon et al. 2012; Baltic Sea, Gorokhova 2015; Arctic Ocean, Lusher et al. 2015a). As microplastics research is still in its relative infancy, the extent to which microplastics are ingested by zooplankton and the consequences of this behaviour are uncertain. Nevertheless, exposure to microplastics could lead to entanglement of particles within feeding appendages and/or block internal organs, which may result in reduced feeding, poor overall health, injury and death (Desforges et al. 2015). Though a lab study has found that microplastics are expelled by zooplankton after ingestion, the gut-retention times varied between species, and there is the potential risk of exposure to toxins that leech off of particles while in the body (Cole et al. 2013; the below video is from the afore-mentioned study showing how plankton eat plastics, which are illuminated in fluorescent green).

The large knowledge gap regarding the health implications indicates a strong need for more laboratory studies that investigate the long-term effects of persistent exposure to microplastics on lower trophic organisms, as well as continued short-term experiments that examine whether different zooplankton species are affected differently, since morphologies and life-histories vary widely.

Let’s take a step back and re-focus our lens onto a marine taxa that is much, much bigger in size than a zooplankton: cetaceans. Plastic debris has been documented in the stomachs of stranded individuals of several cetacean species (See Baulch & Perry 2014 for a review), however findings of microplastics in cetaceans are less common. Since cetaceans consume large amounts of prey a day, up to several tons daily for some baleen whales, the likelihood that they are ingesting microplastics through their prey is relatively high (Nelms et al. 2018). Therefore the low number of reported cases is again likely due to the relative novelty of microplastic detection methods. Despite the paucity of studies, microplastics have been found in a True’s beaked whale (Mesoplodon mirus, Lusher et al. 2015b), a humpback whale (Megaptera novaeangliae, Besseling et al. 2015) and an Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin (Sousa chinensis, Zhu et al. 2018), showing that microplastic ingestion by cetaceans does occur. Whether these individuals actively (i.e. active feeding) or passively (i.e. uptake through prey consumption) consumed the microplastics, or inhaled them at the water-air interface, is unknown. As with zooplankton, the short- and long-term impacts of ingesting microplastics by marine mammals is also unknown, though impacts on survival, feeding and uptake of toxins are all possibilities.

Fig 3. Example of a light trap sample collected off the Newport coast. Source: L. Torres.

The data collection and analysis I am doing for my thesis will hopefully fill small pockets in these large knowledge gaps. I hope to be able to quantify the extent of microplastic pollution among zooplankton species in nearshore Oregon waters. By comparing samples from several years, months and locations, I will determine whether microplastic loads vary spatially and temporally. Since their abundance and presence have been described as being patchy due to the influence of oceanographic and weather conditions (GESAMP 2016), it would seem reasonable to assume that there will be variation. But, results are a ways away as we have not even started our microplastic extraction techniques, which involves digesting samples in potassium hydroxide solution, incubating them at 50ºC for 48-72 hours, sorting through the dissolved material to identify potential plastics and sending them away for analysis. We first have to work our way through jars upon jars of unopened zooplankton light trap samplesthat need to be sorted by species. I am thankfully joined by undergraduate Robyn Norman who has already assisted this project immensely over the last two years with her zooplankton sorting prowess. So in case anyone wants to come looking for us over the next few weeks, you’ll find both Robyn and me sitting in front of a laminar flow hood in the lab of ecotoxicologist Dr. Susanne Brander, with whom we are collaborating on the microplastics portion of my thesis.

References

Baulch, S., & Perry, C., Evaluating the impacts of marine debris on cetaceans. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 2014. 80(1-2): 210-221.

Besseling, E., et al., Microplastic in a macro filter feeder: humpback whale Megaptera novaeangliae. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 2015. 95: 248-252.

Botterell, Z.L.R., et al., Bioavailability and effects of microplastics on marine zooplankton: a review. Environmental Pollution, 2018. 245: 98-110.

Claessens, M., et al., New techniques for the detection of microplastics in sediments and field collected organisms. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 2013. 70(1-2): 227-233.

Cole, M., et al., Microplastic ingestion by zooplankton. Environmental Science & Technology, 2013. 47(12): 6646-6655.

Collignon, A., et al., Neustonic microplastic and zooplankton in the North Western Mediterranean Sea. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 2012. 64(4): 861-864.

Desforges, JP.W., et al., Ingestion of microplastics by zooplankton in the Northeast Pacific Ocean. Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology, 2015. 69(3): 320-330.

Eriksen, M., et al., Plastic pollution in the world’s oceans: more than 5 trillion plastic pieces weighing over 250,000 tons afloat at sea. PLoS ONE, 2014. doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0111913.

Fendall, L.S., & Sewell, M.A., Contributing to marine pollution by washing your face: microplastics in facial cleansers. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 2009. 58(8): 1225-1228.

Frias, J.P.G.L., et al., Evidence of microplastics in samples of zooplankton from Portuguese coastal waters. Marine Environmental Research, 2014. 95: 89-95.

GESAMP, Sources, fates and effects of microplastics in the marine environment: part 2 of a global assessment. Second United Nations Environment Assembly, 2016. http://www.gesamp.org/site/assets/files/1720/rs93e.pdf

Gorokhova, E., Screening for microplastic particles in plankton samples: how to integrate marine litter assessment into existing monitoring programs? Marine Pollution Bulletin, 2015. 99(1-2): 271-275.

Lusher, A.L., et al., Microplastics in Arctic polar waters: the first reported values of particles in surface and sub-surface samples. Scientific Reports, 2015a. 5: 14947.

Lusher, A.L., et al., Microplastic and macroplastic ingestion by a deep diving, oceanic cetacean: the True’s beaked whales Mesoplodon mirus. Environmental Pollution, 2015b. 199: 185-191.

Machovsky-Capuska, G.E., et al., A nutritional perspective on plastic ingestion in wildlife. Science of the Total Environment, 2019. 656: 789-796.

Nelms, S.E., et al., Investigating microplastic trophic transfer in marine top predators. Environmental Pollution, 2018. 238: 999-1007.

Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Scientific and Technical Advisory Panel – GEF (2012), Impacts of marine debris on biodiversity: current status and potential solutions. Montreal, Technical Series. 67: 1-61.

Sun, X., et al., Ingestion of microplastics by natural zooplankton groups in the northern South China Sea. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 2017. 115(1-2): 217-224.

Thompson, R.C., et al., Lost at sea: where is all the plastic? Science, 2004. 304(5672): 838.

Zhu, J., et al., Cetaceans and microplastics: First report of microplastic ingestion by a coastal delphinid, Sousa chinensis. Science of the Total Environment, 2018. 659: 649-654.

Looking through the scope: A world of small marine bugs

By Robyn Norman, GEMM Lab summer 2018 intern, OSU undergraduate

Although the average human may think all zooplankton are the same, to a whale, not all zooplankton are created equal. Just like us, different whales tend to favor different types of food over others. Thus, creating a meal perfect for each individual preference. Using a plankton net off the side of our kayak, each day we take different samples, hoping to figure out more about prey and what species the whales, we see, like best. These samples are then transported back to the lab for analysis and identification. After almost a year of identifying zooplankton and countless hours of looking through the microscope you would think I would have seen everything these tiny organisms have to offer. Identifying mysid shrimp and other zooplankton to species level can be extremely difficult and time consuming, but equally rewarding. Many zooplankton studies often stop counting at 300 or 400 organisms, however in one very long day in July, I counted over 2,000 individuals. Zooplankton tend to be more difficult to work with due to their small size, fragility, and large quantity.

Figure 1. A sample fresh off the kayak in the beginning stages of identification. Photo by Robyn Norman.

A sample that looks quick and easy can turn into a never-ending search for the smallest of mysids. Most of the mysids that I have sorted can be as small as 5 mm in length. Being difficult to identify is an understatement. Figure 1 shows a sample in the beginning stages of analysis, with a wide range of mysids and other zooplankton. Different species of mysid shrimp generally have the same body shape, structure, size, eyes and everything else you can think of. The only way to easily tell them apart is by their telson, which is a unique structure of their tail. Their telsons cannot be seen with the naked eye and it can also be hard to find with a microscope if you do not know exactly what you are looking for.

Throughout my time identifying these tiny creatures I have found 9 different species of mysid from this gray whale foraging ecology project in Port Orford from the 2017 summer. But in 2018 three mysid species have been particularly abundant, Holmesimysis sculpta, Neomysis rayii, and Neomysis mercedis.

Figure 2. Picture taken with microscope of a *Holmesimysis sculpta* telson. Photo by Robyn Norman.

H. sculpta has a unique telson with about 18 lateral spines that stop as they reach the end of the telson (Figure 2). The end of the telson has 4 large spines that slightly curve to make a fork or scoop-like shape. From my own observations I have also noticed that H. sculpta has darker coloring throughout their bodies and are often heavily pregnant (or at least during the month of August). Neomysis rayii and Neomysis mercedis have been extremely difficult to identify and work with. While N. rayii can grow up to 65 mm, they can also often be the same small size as N. mercedis. The telsons of these two species are very similar, making them too similar to compare and differentiate. However, N. rayii can grow substantially bigger than N. mercedis, making the bigger shrimp easier to identify. Unfortunately, the small N. rayii still give birth to even smaller mysid babies, which can be confused as large N. mercedis. Identifying them in a timely manner is almost impossible. After a long discussion, we decided it would be easier to group these two species of Neomysis together and then sub-group by size. Our three categories were 1-10 mm, 11-15 mm, 16+ mm. According to the literature, N. mercedis are typically 11-15 mm meaning that anything over this size should be a N. rayii (McLaughlin 1980).

Figure 3. Microscopic photo of a gammarid. Photo source: WikiMedia.

Figure 4. Caprellidae found in sample with unique coloration. Photo by Robyn Norman.

While mysids comprise the majority of our samples, they are not the only zooplankton that I see. Amphipods are often caught along with the shrimp. Gammarids look like the terrestrial potato bug and can grow larger than some species of mysid (Fig. 3).

As well as, Caprellidae (Fig. 4) that remind me of little tiny aliens as they have large claws compared to their body size, making it hard to get them out of our plankton net. These impressive creatures are surprisingly hardy and can withstand long times in the freezer or being poked with tweezers under a microscope without dying.

In 2017, there was a high abundance of amphipods found in both of our study sites, Mill Rocks and Tichenor Cove. Mill Rocks surprisingly had 4 times the number of amphipods than Tichenor Cove. This result could be one of the possible reasons gray whales were observed more in Mill Rocks last year. Mill Rocks also has a substantial amount of kelp, a popular place for mysid swarms and amphipods. The occurrence of mysids at each of these sites was almost equal, whereas amphipods were almost exclusively found at Mill Rocks. Mill Rocks also had a higher average number of organisms than Tichenor Cove per samples, potentially creating better feeding grounds for gray whales here in Port Orford.

Analyzing the 2018 data I can already see some differences between the two years. In 2018 the main species of mysid that we are finding in both sites are Neomysis sp. and Holmesimysis sculpta, whereas in 2017 Alienacanthomysis macropsis, a species of mysid identified by their long eye stalks and blunt telson, made up the majority of samples from Tichenor Cove. There has also been a large decrease in amphipods from both locations compared to last year. Two samples from Mill Rocks in 2017 had over 300 amphipods, however this year less than 100 have been counted in total. All these differences in zooplankton prey availability may influence whale behavior and movement patterns. Further data analysis aims to uncover this possibility.

Figure 5. 2017 zooplankton community analysis from Tichenor Cove. There was a higher percentage and abundance of *Neomysis rayii* (yellow) and *Alienacanthomysis macropsis* (orange) than in Mill Rocks.

Figure 6. 2017 zooplankton community analysis from Mill Rocks. There was a higher abundance and percentage of amphipods (blue) and *Holmesimysis sculpta* (brown) than in Tichenor cove. Caprellidae (red) increased during the middle of the season, and decreased substantially towards the end.

The past 6 weeks working as part of the 2018 gray whale foraging ecology research team in Port Orford have been nothing short of amazing. We have seen over 50 whales, identified hundreds of zooplankton, and have spent almost every morning on the water in the kayak. An experience like this is a once in a lifetime opportunity that we were fortunate to be a part of. For the past few years, I have been creating videos to document important and exciting times in my life. I have put together a short video that highlights the amazing things we did every day in Port Orford, as well as the creatures that live just below the surface. I hope you enjoy our Gray Whale Foraging Ecology 2018 video with music by Myd – The Sun.

[B]reaching New Discoveries about Gray Whales in Oregon

By Haley Kent, Marine Studies Initiative (MSI) & summer GEMM Lab intern, OSU senior

“BLOW!”, yells a team “Whale Storm” member, as mist remains above the water from an exhaling gray whale (Eschrichtius robustus). While based at the Port Orford Field Station for 6 weeks of my final summer as an undergrad at Oregon State University my heart has only grown fonder for marine wildlife. I am still in awe of this amazing opportunity of researching the foraging ecology of gray whales as a Marine Studies Initiative and GEMM Lab intern. From this field work I have already learned so much about gray whales and their zooplankton prey, and now it’s time to analyze the data we have collected and see what ecological stories we can uncover.

Figure 1. Robyn and Haley enjoy their time in the research kayak. Photo by Lisa Hildebrand.

WORK IN THE FIELD

This internship is my first field work experience and I have learned many skills and demands needed to study marine wildlife: waking up before the sun (every day begins with screaming alarms), being engulfed by nature (Port Orford is a jaw-dropping location with rich biodiversity), packing up damp gear and equipment to only get my feet wet in the morning ocean waves again, and of course waiting on the weather to cooperate (fog, wind, swell). I wouldn’t want it any other way.

Figure 2. Smokey sunrise from the research kayak. Photo by Haley Kent.

Whether it is standing above the ocean on the ‘Cliff Site’ or sitting in our two-man kayak, every day of this internship has been full of new learning experiences. Using various field work techniques, such as using a theodolite (surveying equipment to track whale location and behavior), Secchi disks (to measure water clarity), GoPro data collection, taking photos of wildlife, and many more tools, have given me a new bank of valuable skills that will stick with me into my future career.

Figure 3. Haley drops Secchi disk from the research kayak. Photo by Dylan Gregory.

Data Analysis

To maximize my amazing internship experience, I am conducting a small data analysis project using the data we have collected these past weeks and in previous summers. There are so many questions that can be asked of these data, but I am particularly interested in how many times individual gray whales return to our study area to forage seasonally or annually, and if these individual whales forage preferentially where certain zooplankton prey are available.

Photo Identification

After many hours of data collection in the field either in the kayak or on the cliff, we get to take a breather in the lab to work on various projects we are each assigned. Some job tasks include processing data, identifying zooplankton, and looking through the photos taken that day to potentially identify a known whale. Once photos are processed and saved onto the rugged laptop, they are ready for some serious one on one. Looking through each of the 300 photos captured each day can be very tedious, but it is worthwhile when a match is found. Within the photos of each individual whale I first determine whether it is the left or right side of the whale – if we are lucky we get both! – and maybe even a fluke (tail) photo!

Figure 4. Buttons’ left side. Photo taken by Gray Whale Team of 2018.

Figure 5. Buttons’ left side. Photo taken by Gray Whale Team of 2017.

The angles of these photos (Fig. 4 & 5) are very different, so it could be difficult to tell these are the same whale. But, have a closer look at the pigmentation patterns on this whale. Focus on a single spot or area of spots, and see how patterns line up. Does that match in the same area in the next photo? If yes, you could have yourself a match!

Buttons, one of the identified gray whales (Fig. 4 & 5), was seen in 2016, 17, and 18. I was so excited to identify Buttons for the 3^rdyear in a row as this result demonstrates this whale’s preference for foraging in Port Orford.

Zooplankton and whale foraging behavior

By using the theodolite we track the whale’s position from the cliff location. I have plugged these coordinates into Google Earth, and compared the coordinates to our zooplankton sample stations from that same day. These methods allow me to assess where the whale spent time, and where it did not, which I can then relate to the zooplankton species and abundance we caught in our sample tows (we use a net from the research kayak to collect samples throughout the water column).

Figure 6. *Holmesimysis sculpta*. This species can range between 4-12mm. The size of this zooplankton relative to the large gray whales foraging on it shows the whale’s incredible senses for prey preference. Photo source: Scripps Institute of Oceanography.

Results (preliminary)

‘Eyeball’ is one of our resident whales that we have identified regularly throughout this season here in Port Orford. I have compared the amount of time Eyeball has spent near zooplankton stations to the prey community we captured at each station.

There is a positive trend in the amount of time the whale spent in an area with the percent abundance of Holmesimysis sculpta (Fig. 7: blue trend line).

Figure 7. Comparative plot between the amount of time the whale “Eyeball” spent within 50m of each zooplankton sampling station and the relative amount of zooplankton species caught at each station. Note the positive trend between time and *Holmesimysis sculpta*, and the negative trend relative to *Neomysis* sp. or Caprellidae.

Conversely, there is an inverse trend with two other zooplankton species: Neomysis sp. (grey trend line) and Caprellidae (orange trend line). These results suggest that Eyeball has a foraging preference for areas where Holmesimysis sculpta (Fig. 6) is more abundant. Who would have known a whale could be so picky? Once the season comes to an end, I plan to use more of our data to continue to make discoveries about the foraging preferences of gray whales in Oregon.

What REALLY is a Wildlife Biologist?

By Alexa Kownacki, Ph.D. Student, OSU Department of Fisheries and Wildlife, Geospatial Ecology of Marine Megafauna Lab

The first lecture slide. Source: Lecture1_Population Dynamics_Lou Botsford

This was the very first lecture slide in my population dynamics course at UC Davis. Population dynamics was infamous in our department for being an ultimate rite of passage due to its notoriously challenging curriculum. So, when Professor Lou Botsford pointed to his slide, all 120 of us Wildlife, Fish, and Conservation Biology majors, didn’t know how to react. Finally, he announced, “This [pointing to the slide] is all of you”. The class laughed. Lou smirked. Lou knew.

Lou knew that there is more truth to this meme than words could express. I can’t tell you how many times friends and acquaintances have asked me if I was going to be a park ranger. Incredibly, not all—or even most—wildlife biologists are park rangers. I’m sure that at one point, my parents had hoped I’d be holding a tiger cub as part of a conservation project—that has never happened. Society may think that all wildlife biologists want to walk in the footsteps of the famous Steven Irwin and say thinks like “Crikey!”—but I can’t remember the last time I uttered that exclamation with the exception of doing a Steve Irwin impression. Hollywood may think we hug trees—and, don’t get me wrong, I love a good tie-dyed shirt—but most of us believe in the principles of conservation and wise-use A.K.A. we know that some trees must be cut down to support our needs. Helicoptering into a remote location to dart and take samples from wild bear populations…HA. Good one. I tell myself this is what I do sometimes, and then the chopper crashes and I wake up from my dream. But, actually, a scientist staring at a computer with stacks of papers spread across every surface, is me and almost every wildlife biologist that I know.

The “dry lab” on the R/V Nathaniel B. Palmer en route to Antarctica. This room full of technology is where the majority of the science takes place. Drake Passage, International Waters in August 2015. Source: Alexa Kownacki

There is an illusion that wildlife biologists are constantly in the field doing all the cool, science-y, outdoors-y things while being followed by a National Geographic photojournalist. Well, let me break it to you, we’re not. Yes, we do have some incredible opportunities. For example, I happen to know that one lab member (eh-hem, Todd), has gotten up close and personal with wild polar bear cubs in the Arctic, and that all of us have taken part in some work that is worthy of a cover image on NatGeo. We love that stuff. For many of us, it’s those few, memorable moments when we are out in the field, wearing pants that we haven’t washed in days, and we finally see our study species AND gather the necessary data, that the stars align. Those are the shining lights in a dark sea of papers, grant-writing, teaching, data management, data analysis, and coding. I’m not saying that we don’t find our desk work enjoyable; we jump for joy when our R script finally runs and we do a little dance when our paper is accepted and we definitely shed a tear of relief when funding comes through (or maybe that’s just me).

A picturesque moment of being a wildlife biologist: Alexa and her coworker, Jim, surveying migrating gray whales. Piedras Blancas Light Station, San Simeon, CA in May 2017. Source: Alexa Kownacki.

What I’m trying to get at is that we accepted our fates as the “scientists in front of computers surrounded by papers” long ago and we embrace it. It’s been almost five years since I was a senior in undergrad and saw this meme for the first time. Five years ago, I wanted to be that scientist surrounded by papers, because I knew that’s where the difference is made. Most people have heard the quote by Mahatma Gandhi, “Be the change that you wish to see in the world.” In my mind, it is that scientist combing through relevant, peer-reviewed scientific papers while writing a compelling and well-researched article, that has the potential to make positive changes. For me, that scientist at the desk is being the change that he/she wish to see in the world.

Scientists aboard the R/V Nathaniel B. Palmer using the time in between net tows to draft papers and analyze data…note the facial expressions. Antarctic Peninsula in August 2015. Source: Alexa Kownacki.

One of my favorite people to colloquially reference in the wildlife biology field is Milton Love, a research biologist at the University of California Santa Barbara, because he tells it how it is. In his oh-so-true-it-hurts website, he has a page titled, “So You Want To Be A Marine Biologist?” that highlights what he refers to as, “Three really, really bad reasons to want to be a marine biologist” and “Two really, really good reasons to want to be a marine biologist”. I HIGHLY suggest you read them verbatim on his site, whether you think you want to be a marine biologist or not because they’re downright hilarious. However, I will paraphrase if you just can’t be bothered to open up a new tab and go down a laugh-filled wormhole.

Really, Really Bad Reasons to Want to be a Marine Biologist:

To talk to dolphins. Hint: They don’t want to talk to you…and you probably like your face.
You like Jacques Cousteau. Hint: I like cheese…doesn’t mean I want to be cheese.
Hint: Lack thereof.

Really, Really Good Reasons to Want to be a Marine Biologist:

Work attire/attitude. Hint: Dress for the job you want finally translates to board shorts and tank tops.
You like it. *BINGO*

Alexa with colleagues showing the “cool” part of the job is working the zooplankton net tows. This DOES have required attire: steel-toed boots, hard hat, and float coat. R/V Nathaniel B. Palmer, Antarctic Peninsula in August 2015. Source: Alexa Kownacki.

In summary, as wildlife or marine biologists we’ve taken a vow of poverty, and in doing so, we’ve committed ourselves to fulfilling lives with incredible experiences and being the change we wish to see in the world. To those of you who want to pursue a career in wildlife or marine biology—even after reading this—then do it. And to those who don’t, hopefully you have a better understanding of why wearing jeans is our version of “business formal”.

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: