{"id":2366,"date":"2018-10-08T20:20:33","date_gmt":"2018-10-08T20:20:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/?p=2366"},"modified":"2018-10-08T20:20:33","modified_gmt":"2018-10-08T20:20:33","slug":"albatrosses-at-sunrise-dolphins-at-sunset-northern-california-current-cruise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/2018\/10\/08\/albatrosses-at-sunrise-dolphins-at-sunset-northern-california-current-cruise\/","title":{"rendered":"Albatrosses at sunrise, dolphins at sunset: Northern California Current cruise"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Dawn Barlow, PhD student, Geospatial Ecology of Marine Megafauna Lab, Department of Fisheries and Wildlife, Oregon State University<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sun on my face and wind in my hair, scanning the expanse of blue. Forty minutes on, twenty minutes off, from sunrise until sunset, day after day. Hours of seemingly empty blue, punctuated by graceful black-footed albatrosses wheeling and gliding over the swells, by the splashing approach of a curious group of Pacific white-sided dolphins coming to play in the bow of the ship, by whale spouts on the horizon and the occasional breaching humpback. A flurry of data entry\u2014geographic coordinates, bearing and distance from the ship, number of animals, species identification, behavior\u2014and then back to blue.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Scanning for marine mammals from the flying bridge of NOAA ship Bell M. Shimada. Photo: Jess O’Loughlin.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I\u2019ve just returned from the Northern California Current (NCC) ecosystem cruise aboard NOAA ship Bell M. Shimada. My role on board was the marine mammal observer, logging marine mammal sightings during the transits between sampling stations. We surveyed and sampled between Cape Mears, Oregon and Trinidad, California, from right along the coast out to 200 nautical miles offshore. Resources in the marine environment are patchy, and our coastline is highly productive. This diversity in environmental conditions creates niche habitats for many species, which is one reason why surveying and sampling across a broad geographic range can be so informative. We left Newport surrounded by gray whales, feeding in green, chilly waters at temperatures around 12\u00b0C. Moving west, the marine mammal and seabird sightings were increasingly sparse, the water increasingly blue, and the surface temperature warmed to a balmy 17\u00b0C. We had reached offshore waters, an ocean region sometimes referred to as the \u201cblue desert\u201d. For an entire day I didn\u2019t see a single marine mammal and only just a few seabirds, until a handful of common dolphins\u2014more frequently seen in warm-temperate and tropical waters to the south\u2014joined the ship at sunset. As we transited back inshore over the productive Heceta Bank, the water became cooler and greener. I stayed busy logging sightings of humpback and gray whales, harbor porpoise and Dall\u2019s porpoise, pacific white-sided dolphins and sea lions. These far-ranging marine predators must find a way to make a living in the patchy and dynamic ocean environment, and therefore their distribution is also patchy\u2014aggregated around areas of high productivity and prey availability, and occasionally seen transiting in between.<\/p>\n

Here are a few cruise highlights:<\/p>\n

Curious groups of common dolphins<\/strong> (Delphinus delphis<\/em>) came to play in the bow wake of the ship and even checked out the plankton nets when they were deployed. Common dolphins are typically found further south, however we saw several groups of them in the warmer waters far offshore.<\/p>\n