WOW! That is cold water. Seriously. 50 degrees I think. A group of us went to use some kayaks/canoes, and about four strokes away from the dock, our canoe tipped. And we all swam to shore but I literally could not breath. I am just so thankful that we were so close to land!
Tomorrow we all get to present our ideas at our first "Roundtable on Research" discussion. A good way for us to all, informally, find out about what we're researching. This week will be pretty busy with our proposal paper due on Friday! Time to get to work!
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Lobsters, Crabs, and Seals
Today we got up early and drove to the Darling Marine Center, where we boarded the R/V Ira C boat. We cruised through towards the open ocean (but not quite there) and made three stops for oceanographic stations, where we did some typical measurements and sampling. One of the things we did that I haven't done before was a bottom trawl, where (I don't know if I approve of this) we dragged a net on the bottom of the sea for about 10 minutes and brought it up to count everything in it. Among the hardy lobsters and crabs there were also some bottom dwelling fish that probably died. I kept taking some and throwing them back when no one was looking, so if you're reading this and you were the one taking a tally of what we caught.... maybe add on 10 urchins and 5 soft shelled lobsters and at least 10 fish. On the cruise we also saw several little seals just swimming around enjoying the 14degree C water.
Here's a picture from Guatemala. from Manute's camera.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
I blog, You blog.
Day two at the lab!
We did a lot of brainstorming today, as well as learning some of the general tasks the Fields lab does. We walked through how to autoclave filtered sea water so it can be clean enough to use with cultures. We then went through and learned the careful techniques of transferring the culture stocks to keep them fresh. Along the way we did another tow, and sorted the Acartia from the Tamora (sp?). We also concluded that our first batch died because of the bleach in the water... learning from mistakes!
Tomorrow we're going out on a boat for the day, using a vessel from the Darling lab (sp?) about an hour away. It should be a nice day, and a nice break from land. My new rain boots will come in handy!
That's it for now!
We did a lot of brainstorming today, as well as learning some of the general tasks the Fields lab does. We walked through how to autoclave filtered sea water so it can be clean enough to use with cultures. We then went through and learned the careful techniques of transferring the culture stocks to keep them fresh. Along the way we did another tow, and sorted the Acartia from the Tamora (sp?). We also concluded that our first batch died because of the bleach in the water... learning from mistakes!
Tomorrow we're going out on a boat for the day, using a vessel from the Darling lab (sp?) about an hour away. It should be a nice day, and a nice break from land. My new rain boots will come in handy!
That's it for now!
Monday, June 7, 2010
MaineMaineMaineMaine
Hello Ocean!
Well, here I am! Back on the coast. This time though, it's bit north of my science comfort zone. All 11 (12?) of us arrived here in harborfields yesterday, and claimed rooms in either the "1780 House" (5 guys, 4 girls) or the little cottage (3 girls). I'm sharing a room in the 1780 house with two other ladies, and I have yet to find out if the house is actually from the 1780s but judging by the slope and slant and noise of everything, I'd believe it. We hail from all over: Maine, Minnesota (me!), Washington, Texas, Puerto Rico, Colorado, etc. We're still in the slightly awkward/uncomfortable jumping into friendships stage, but I'm hopeful for the future.
This morning we all walked over to the lab, which consists of a main office-type building, a "double-wide" filled with labs, a "triple-wide" filled with labs, a couple docks, a conference room, and a shared library. All of which sits on the harbor that we live across. I'm convinced that it would take me less energy to row boat across each morning instead of walking 15-20 minutes, so we'll see how that goes. We got a formal introduction of all the research scientists (about 10?) who do their thang there at Bigelow, and then after some tours and logistics talk we met with our mentors. My mentor is Dr. David Fields, and I think I'm going to have a great summer with him. His lab is super awesome, even though I have no idea how to find anything in it yet. He has a bunch of really unique equipment, hopefully some of which I'll be using. One of the cool things he does is he videotapes the behavior of things (like plankton, or krill, or anything) in reaction to stimulants. He's even thinking about seeing how they react to oil... which could be really important... like rrrrreally important.
Well, here I am! Back on the coast. This time though, it's bit north of my science comfort zone. All 11 (12?) of us arrived here in harborfields yesterday, and claimed rooms in either the "1780 House" (5 guys, 4 girls) or the little cottage (3 girls). I'm sharing a room in the 1780 house with two other ladies, and I have yet to find out if the house is actually from the 1780s but judging by the slope and slant and noise of everything, I'd believe it. We hail from all over: Maine, Minnesota (me!), Washington, Texas, Puerto Rico, Colorado, etc. We're still in the slightly awkward/uncomfortable jumping into friendships stage, but I'm hopeful for the future.
This morning we all walked over to the lab, which consists of a main office-type building, a "double-wide" filled with labs, a "triple-wide" filled with labs, a couple docks, a conference room, and a shared library. All of which sits on the harbor that we live across. I'm convinced that it would take me less energy to row boat across each morning instead of walking 15-20 minutes, so we'll see how that goes. We got a formal introduction of all the research scientists (about 10?) who do their thang there at Bigelow, and then after some tours and logistics talk we met with our mentors. My mentor is Dr. David Fields, and I think I'm going to have a great summer with him. His lab is super awesome, even though I have no idea how to find anything in it yet. He has a bunch of really unique equipment, hopefully some of which I'll be using. One of the cool things he does is he videotapes the behavior of things (like plankton, or krill, or anything) in reaction to stimulants. He's even thinking about seeing how they react to oil... which could be really important... like rrrrreally important.
The location is a lot like an up north Minnesota area, except all the water is salty. I thought I saw a leech off the dock today but it was really a little eel. The closest Grand Marais-type town is about a 15 minute drive, and the closest town with a Target/Walgreens is about an hour. A guy working in our lab though is going to let me borrow his bike for the summer. Sweet!
Goodnight for now!
Thursday, May 20, 2010
GuatGuatGuatGuat
Summer is here! And I will be leaving for Guatemala on Sunday morning at 5:20am. You might think that means I'm arriving at the airport at 5:2oam, but you are wrong. The plane takes off from the runway at 5:20am. All 24 of us will be getting to the airport at 3:45am to wait for the check-in desk to open.
Elliot's graduation from Purdue was last weekend. I went a couple days early to hang out with my cousin Allie and that was super fun. Beyond that, I've been doing things around the house, mosaic-ing a little fountain, and getting prepped for the trip. I've taken my typhoid fever tablets, and I start on my malaria tablets tomorrow!
The sad news about this trip back home is that Picosa has closed. No more fun salsa dancing in minneapolis. Hopefully Boothbay Harbor has a salsa joint.
Elliot's graduation from Purdue was last weekend. I went a couple days early to hang out with my cousin Allie and that was super fun. Beyond that, I've been doing things around the house, mosaic-ing a little fountain, and getting prepped for the trip. I've taken my typhoid fever tablets, and I start on my malaria tablets tomorrow!
The sad news about this trip back home is that Picosa has closed. No more fun salsa dancing in minneapolis. Hopefully Boothbay Harbor has a salsa joint.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Ice cream truck!
It's finally spring, and it's so beautiful outside! I've been to the beach several times in the past couple weeks, and it's been so enjoyable. Classes are getting to the end.. just a few more big things before finals. I signed a lease on a house with Michelle and Cody and we should be moving in within the month! The whole house thing has been a huge growing up moment; finding a house, talking to a realtor, negotiating things, paying by money order, figuring out insurance, figuring out electric/cable/water/trash/lawn maintenance. Crazy!
I have firmed up my summer plans, which will involve being home a total of 3-4 weeks, going to Guatemala (!!!!!!), and spending the majority in Maine.
I have firmed up my summer plans, which will involve being home a total of 3-4 weeks, going to Guatemala (!!!!!!), and spending the majority in Maine.
Monday, March 1, 2010
I bought a sewing machine
Well, well, well. It has been a cold winter. The part when I was in Florida, the part when I went back home, and the part when I'm back in Florida. All cold. Which is what I'm blaming my lack-of-blogging on. Coldness. Because any sort of excuse is a silly one.
While it has been cold, I've been doing a lot of hibernating in my bed, a lot of TV watching, a lot of organizing, a lot of list-making, a lot of cooking, a lot of eating, a lot of thinking about doing things, and not a whole lot of actually getting things done. In the midst of diving into this spring semester I've taken on several boringly difficult classes. Differential Equations is taught by a man who wore all gray today (including his hair), and responds to questions with "It is so simple, you will understand." Meteorology is actually quite a rigorous course which is using a lot of the info we've learned from oceanography, environmental science, and calculus. It is however, extremely difficult and graded quite unfairly. "Intro to C++" should be under the foreign language section of registration, and should give you more than 50% on a project if you have one line mixed up. Geological Oceanography has been a sequence of maybe 5-6 conference calls, with too much confusion on what the correct phone number was, and a total of one emailed homework assignment. Our teacher is "working in italy" but I've seen him on campus at least 3 times....? Physics is just dandy, doing all the electricity and magnetism junk that is so fun.
I haven't been working in the lab as much as I should this semester. This past weekend I went with Jen to collect green mussels in Sebastien, but when we left our buckets were empty :( No mussels to be found. It's probably because of the cold water temperatures for so long this winter.
I present at FAS on March 19th, so I've been putting together a presentation for that even though I haven't finished processing all the data.. uh oh!
And... B-I-G-N-E-W-S-! I got accepted into the Bigelow Lab REU for the summer! Wahoo! I have to decide by March 15th whether I'm going or not.
While it has been cold, I've been doing a lot of hibernating in my bed, a lot of TV watching, a lot of organizing, a lot of list-making, a lot of cooking, a lot of eating, a lot of thinking about doing things, and not a whole lot of actually getting things done. In the midst of diving into this spring semester I've taken on several boringly difficult classes. Differential Equations is taught by a man who wore all gray today (including his hair), and responds to questions with "It is so simple, you will understand." Meteorology is actually quite a rigorous course which is using a lot of the info we've learned from oceanography, environmental science, and calculus. It is however, extremely difficult and graded quite unfairly. "Intro to C++" should be under the foreign language section of registration, and should give you more than 50% on a project if you have one line mixed up. Geological Oceanography has been a sequence of maybe 5-6 conference calls, with too much confusion on what the correct phone number was, and a total of one emailed homework assignment. Our teacher is "working in italy" but I've seen him on campus at least 3 times....? Physics is just dandy, doing all the electricity and magnetism junk that is so fun.
I haven't been working in the lab as much as I should this semester. This past weekend I went with Jen to collect green mussels in Sebastien, but when we left our buckets were empty :( No mussels to be found. It's probably because of the cold water temperatures for so long this winter.
I present at FAS on March 19th, so I've been putting together a presentation for that even though I haven't finished processing all the data.. uh oh!
And... B-I-G-N-E-W-S-! I got accepted into the Bigelow Lab REU for the summer! Wahoo! I have to decide by March 15th whether I'm going or not.
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