B-roll

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Last week was a busy one. On Thursday I was finally able to start shooting footage for the videos and made a trip over to HSMC where I worked with an MRM grad student and three OSG scholars. Everyone was very generous with his/her time and I can’t express enough thanks to the scholars’ patience with the camera issues. When I realized the mic and camera were not compatible, Mark saved the day and I ended up shooting everything on a handi-cam. Probably not the most ideal choice, but given that I was an hour away from any equipment, it was definitely the best choice. After the camera snafu, the day picked up and I worked straight through until about 4 p.m. filming people in their work environments and interacting with other students and visitors.

Overall, I’m getting excited to see how all of the interviews will be connected. Everyone seems to enjoy the work they are doing and gave great answers during the interviews. Unfortunately, the only problem I see now is figuring out how to pare down all of the material into one three-minute video.

Help me out…be curious

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Good estuary tours

As mentioned in previous blog posts, one of the main jobs for the interns at the Visitor Center is giving estuary tours to the public at 11am.  Diana, Nick, Julie, and I trade off giving these tours depending on who wants to do it on a particular day.  It’s not uncommon for one of us to give tours multiple days in a row when the other person is doing the Ocean Quest presentation for that day.   In general, I prefer to do the Ocean Quest presentation because it is very structured and straightforward.   There are very few surprises during the presentation. On the other hand the estuary tours are very unstructured and vary in topic from day to day.  This has its ups and downs and can make them pretty challenging.  In this blog post I am going to outline what a good estuary tour is like.

To start out with, I’ve found the number of people on the tour doesn’t really matter too much.  The level of engagement of the group is what really defines a good estuary tour.  I think this can be said of many things in life (I’m sure any teacher/professor could say the same thing).  I have just come to realization because of these estuary tours.  So step one, get an engaged group.  I usually take my tour through the doors leading to the education wing where I can then introduce myself outside the hustle and bustle of the Visitor Center.  I then usually head to the tank farm outside where I can give some interesting facts about HMSC such as the number of scientists working, the number of federal and state organization, etc.  Today was particularly cool because Dr. John Chapman, HMSCs Invasive Species Specialist, was at the tank farm.  He gave the tour a very cool rundown of what the current situation is with the Japanese dock that washed ashore earlier this year.  Nothing quite gets a group jazzed like a world-class researcher giving you a rundown on what’s going on in the biology world.

I then usually head past the US Fish and Wildlife building to the estuary trail and head to the mudflats.  I like to stop at the transition between the highlands and the salt marsh to explain how some plants have adapted to a salty environment.  There is a very distinct visible line where shrubs and trees stop growing and salty plants begin to grow.  I really like looking at this line and then heading down to eat some of the salt-adapted plants.  I try to get everyone to eat pickleweed which just tastes like salt.  After that little adventure we make our way down to the mudflat where we suck out some shrimp with a slurp-gun.  Nobody enjoys sucking shrimp out more than the kids.  They could do this for hours (I have actually had a family do this for an entire hour).  If the crowd looks up to it I head to the part of the estuary trail that has eroded and explain the different forces at work that cause erosion on an estuary and explain different techniques to mitigate erosion.

Lastly I’ll head to the water storage tank and to the saltwater stream and explain how the tank has more water in it than an Olympic sized swimming pool and the saltwater stream is unique because it’s a saltwater stream.  Then we’ll head back and call it a tour.

As I mentioned earlier what really makes a tour successful in my eyes is when the group is interested and engaged.  The more questions the better.  Everyday I hope that my group will be excited to learn about this stuff because it makes the tour way more enjoyable for me.

 

Intertidal Dredging and Data Analysis

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This week we started the second phase of the Yaquina Bay intertidal population study. If you think way back to the first week I was here in Newport, you might remember that I had to wake up really early to do RAM surveys. We took sediment samples, temperature readings, and counted the visible clam siphon holes at random points in different sand/mud flats in the Bay. Now we are going back to these same locations and dredging them to find out exactly how many clams are at each site.

Intertidal dredging is very similar to the subtidal dredging we have been doing, except we get to dredge this time, not divers. Surprisingly, the system is pretty easy to use and the most difficult part seems to be staying in one place when holding the bag end of the dredge. Because of the air in my drysuit a lot of times I just start floating away. Luckily we can only sample when the water isn’t very high (between 2 and 3 feet) so I can get myself back in the right spot fairly quickly.

To work the intertidal dredge requires 3 people: 1 person mans the dredge and sucks up the sediment/clams, 1 person mans the bag and makes sure that the bag doesn’t get clogged and that sediment/water isn’t going towards the dredge head, and the final person is on the boat manning the motor and sorting samples.

I very quickly learned how to do all 3, but I think it was very helpful that I already has indirect experience from all the subtidal work we have done. I was familiar with the data sheets and how the dredge system as a whole worked, so I only needed to learn the exact method of how to use the dredge in the water – and how to efficiently move around in a bulky dry suit.

Next week is more dredging, and at the end of the week we will prep for yet another week of work in Tillamook  – and you thought I was done! hah!

While not out doing fieldwork (we can only dredge a few hours at a time during low tide), I have started a new data analysis project. This will incorporate the historical data I entered over the last few weeks, and some of the data we have been getting this summer. Hopefully I will be able to incorporate all of this together in a cohesive way so I have something to add to my presentation other than 15 slides of our various projects and methods. But don’t get too excited, it will probably just be comparisons of size frequency and abundance. I also don’t think I will have time to run any statistical analysis so I won’t be able to say whether any of the trends we see are significant or not.

During my free time, I have been attempting to enjoy the decent weather we have been having in Newport by surfing a lot, playing beach volleyball, and watching LOTS of Olympics. I feel like all the students here have really started to get along well, and it is a shame we only have 3 short weeks left before we all must continue our journeys elsewhere. Until next time!

 

Moving forward

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Very happy to get out of the office this week to interact with students and interns for work on the videos. On Wednesday I visited HMSC and had a great time working with everyone, despite the troubles I encountered trying to figure out how to operate a camera that uses a tape. Yes, a tape. The wave exhibits the interns created are super neat and seemed to be a big hit with center visitors. The hand-powered exhibit drew people of all ages and a lot of  people were drawn to the electric exhibit, but because it’s waiting for a safety feature, the exhibit is roped off from the public.

I also met with two graduate students who were very happy to share their research projects. One is collecting seafloor core samples and analyzing numbers of mollusks and gastropods in a given area. The other student is developing a harbor seal study to understand the seals’ feeding habits in oxygen deficient water. Not everyone who is interviewed will be included in the clip, but both seem to have potential for the video. Only time will tell.

Glad to be moving forward on the media projects, but wishing I had more time to develop them. The best way to get quality footage is to spend time with your sources and let them begin to act naturally around you. That’s when the good stuff happens. Maybe next week.

Statistics, map, and the fair

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My main project last week involved analyzing the data from the previous week’s cockle surveys and comparing them to the surveys conducted in February. Thus, much of last week was spent in the lab running stats and assembling maps on the computer. By now my GIS skills have sharpened somewhat, and I was able to assemble a map that compares the spatial distribution and densities of cockles in the July survey to those in the February survey. Although there does appear to be a difference, it seems random, and I cannot yet ascertain any significant conclusion from it. My mentor Scott was out of the office all week, so perhaps he will be able to provide some insights on Monday.

I’ve often told people that statistics is the math class I’ve been waiting my whole life for. I have yet to refine my abilities in it, but I find statistics a fascinating way to interpret data and answer questions of interest. The challenge in statistics for me is determining which method is most appropriate to use for a certain situation. Scott left me some suggestions, but it was still up to me to determine which method to use and how to interpret the results. I may have gone a little overboard: I ran two regression analyses of cockle weight vs shell length (one using the “raw” data, which turned out to be nonlinear, and one using transformed data to establish a linear relationship and constant variation); I also ran summary stats for both the February and July surveys. I ran ANOVA tests comparing cockle weights in July vs February and shell lengths in July vs February. I wasn’t sure if ANOVA was appropriate to use, so I additionally ran four nonparametric tests (two with one-sided hypotheses, and two with two-sided hypotheses) for cockle weights and shell lengths in July vs February. I generated boxplots, histograms, and scatterplots comparing cockle sizes and densities. On Monday I anticipate spending time whittling down the stats and analyzing the data. Scott will help me confirm my findings, but so far it looks like there is no significant difference in weights and shell lengths of cockles in July vs February. Maybe they just haven’t grown that much, or maybe I’m out in left field. Who knows?

Last Tuesday I helped staff the ODFW booth at the Coos County fair. We had a 1200-gallon aquarium with rainbow trout, baby cutthroat trout, baby smallmouth bass, and some perch. Despite the awesome showpiece, we weren’t very busy and didn’t have many visitors. It was probably due to it being a Tuesday morning, which constituted a slow day at the fair.

This week we’re scheduled to do a new cockle survey in a new location. We’re going to try and take down more data in the field this time, which should decrease the amount of time we need to spend in the lab. I also look forward to discussing the statistics with Scott and seeing if I’m on the right track with my data interpretation.

A little R&R

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The last week for me has had very little to do with work and more to do with play.  I was very lucky to have nearly a whole week off from working at the Visitor Center to go to a family reunion at Prineville Reservoir in Eastern Oregon. Prineville Reservoir is about 30-40 minutes outside of Bend and is formed by a dam on the Deschutes River. It is definitely a gem of a place to spend a whole week of summer.   The high desert of Oregon in summer is hot.  90+ degrees hot with absolutely no moisture in the air.  Compare this to the balmy high of Newport around 60-65 and you might get an idea of how much of a shift in climate this was for me.  But it was one that was pretty easy to get use to after a day acclimating to my new abode next to the reservoir.  All the kids ended up camping in tents while the parents stayed nice and cool in their air conditioned campers.  The water level depends on the time of year and the previous winters snow pack and this year the water was pretty high which was good for us.

A day at Prineville usually goes about like this:

Wake up around 9:30.

Read/wait for people to get back from the morning water ski run

Eat a huge breakfast around 10:30

Go wakeboarding/wake surfing

Read and eat a small lunch

Go wakeboarding/ wake surfing

Read

Eat a delicious dinner

Campfire

Sleep around 10:30

Repeat

 

Because the water level was pretty high the ski boats weren’t too far of a walk (previous years the water level is so low that it is a bit of a trek to get down to the water). I had never gone wake boarding or wake surfing before and both those were a blast.  Unfortunately I wasnt quite in “Prineville shape” and the first day I really tweaked a muscle in my arm which rendered my right arm pretty useless for the rest of the week.  Besides that little mishap everything else about the week was awesome.  I had a blast and am rested and ready for the rest of the summer at the VC.

And on to the next one

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The NOAA dock subtidal project is officially complete! On Thursday we finished our last 10 sites in Sally’s Bend in no time at all. We were only out on the water until about 11am! Even with measuring clams, we finished in under 8 hours that day, which was really surprising given all the difficulties we had the last time we were out diving in the Yaquina. Its a wonderful feeling to say that during the time I have been working in Newport an entire field project was completed, even if it was a short project.

The rest of this week was spent cleaning up from our Tillamook work (cleaning out the boats, temporarily stashing our equipment, etc) and catching up with office work. I thought bring in the office would a nice change of pace, but compared to the action-packed fieldwork I normally do, sitting in the office started getting old quickly.

Over the past few weeks, I have been slowly entering historical subtidal data from Tillamook Bay surveys. This has been my “go-to” task during the few times we weren’t out doing fieldwork. There is data from the 1975, 1976, 1977, 1985, and 1986 subtidal studies done in Tillamook Bay. There is data on where the transects/stations were located, how many and what type of clams were found at each station, and for most years, the length and weight measurements for the Bay Clams (Butter, Gaper, Littleneck, Cockle).

This week I basically finished entering the data and I just need to get it all looked over by Tony or Stacy to make sure the formatting is correct. Because we have already done a lot of work in Tillamook, I started noticing some difference between the data we have been collecting and the older data. The biggest difference is the sheer number of clams we are finding. Surprisingly, many of the samples we have collected this summer seem to have a much higher density of clams. However, in the past the highest densities belonged to Butter and Native Littlenecks. Presently we are finding A LOT of Butters, but very few Littlenecks. The clams we are finding seem to be in the same average size range as the ones collected in the past. This, of course, is based on what I noticed and can remember, and I can’t say what is or isn’t significant. That type of in-depth analysis can only happen in the winter once the Tillamook study is completed. And speaking of Tillamook, I have pictures!

Tillamook scenery

A full sample bag, yet to be sorted

A Butter clam with a tight grip on the leg of a Dungeness crab

This coming week is going to be a new adventure, as we are going to start intertidal dredging in the Yaquina, sometimes called “Megacoring”. All I know is that my first day is Tuesday and I have to wear a drysuit and learn to use a dredge pump that is slightly smaller than the one we used to get the subtidal samples. I am very excited to learn how to do this, but also a little nervous as I have never had to work in a drysuit before, much less use a dredge pump. But that is what this summer is all about, right?

 

Yaquina Marshes Inspire Intense Thinking

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This has been a thought provoking week for me. Since I am becoming more comfortable with the protocol for our experiments in the field, there is time between sampling to lay back, look at the scenery, and chat with my field mates. Wednesday’s discussion turned into an intense conversation on the nature of research at a government agency vs. academia and other topics regarding scientific research careers. There are pros and cons to taking up research at each place. At the EPA, people a number of levels up decide what questions they want to ask and the scientists are obligated to come up with projects that address these. There is less freedom than in academia. However, a government position seems more stable and less cut-throat in terms of acquiring funding for the research.

Throughout the week I have also been talking with almost everyone from the lab group and they all have different stories and different reasons for obtaining the degrees they did and taking on the position they have. Perspectives have been both positive and negative, so I am trying to take them in and not let any one opinion dominate or take over my own view of the world. I need to figure out what path would be best for me. After all of these discussions, I met with Robert Allan who is the Director of Student Development at the College of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences at OSU. It was a very helpful conversation as it gave me a direction to go in toward making my own story, after I was overwhelmed by so many other opinions.

This week should be another good week on the nutrient uptake project. Last week we went to this beautiful marsh up the Yaquina called Winant. We are going to be doing a lot of samples there because it is our baseline marsh, so we may not be travelling as far in the next few weeks. This may give me more time to look at the data and start to figure out how I want to present my work. There are only four weeks left now to get so much done!