One of the major concerns with climate change relates to habitat changes for the plants and animals. Will aspen survive anywhere in the United States? What trees will be able to survive in Connecticut in 2050? 2100? Where will elk be able to survive in 2100?

Of course these aren’t easy predictions to make since each species has distinct environmental requirements. Even more troubling though is that many have complex relationships with other organisms, both beneficial and detrimental. Then there are the often complex food webs that each species is a member. some webs are resilient to loss of several species but others collapse with the loss of only one.

While sea temperatures are generally more stable than air temps in terrestrial systems, many of the marine animals have even tighter requirements for temperature. Even a change in just a few °C can prevent reproduction, reduce lifespans, or even cause death. That is the case with the Icelandic Scallop. In some recent experiments it was found that the scallops had a significantly higher mortality in temperatures above 12°C. Average summer sea surface temperatures off Iceland’s southern coast have been in excess of 10°C in recent years and have been rising. A +2°C change over the previous decades has brought the average summer sea surface temperature very near the scallop’s maximum threshold. While the scallops are still able to survive, there has been a marked increase in adult mortality.

Icelandic Scallop - Image from http://www.osl.gc.ca/guide_sp/en/invert/sp/c-islandica.html

Increasing temperature may not directly be the primary cause of the recent increases in mortality of the scallops, though it has been strongly implicated. In recent years, a protozoan parasite has affected much of the stock of C. islandica around Iceland. As with the scallop itself, many protozoan parasites have been found to have temperature thresholds and ideal temperature ranges. For instance Perkinsus atlanticus populations under controlled experiments did not grow, in temperatures of 5°C, grew slowly at 16°C, and grew quickly at 20°C and 26°C. It also failed to grow and died out after 4 days at an experimental temperature of 37°C. Similarly, two other protozoan parasites of interest on the Atlantic Coast are also temperature controlled: Parkinsus marinus, the cause of the disease dermo in oysters, requires temperatures above 25°C to thrive, Haplosporidium nelsoni, which causes MSX in oysters (although it can survive and multiply at temperatures of 5°C-25°C) requires temperatures above 20°C to infect a new oyster. Temperature is likely also a controlling factor in the spread of the protozoan infecting C. islandica.

While the Iceland Scallop is what instigated this post, the topic of climate change and its effect on marine animals, particularly fish, is one I have been thinking of a lot lately. In much the same way that the scallops are temperature limited, fish have ideal and survivable temperature ranges, and temperature can play a significant role on growth and reproductive success. Complicating the issue is that many of the fish have very specific habitat preferences or needs as well.

Atlantic Wolffish - Photo copyright Peter Auster from http://www.nurc.uconn.edu/bigmouthfishes/photos/SBNMS/content/neg7_large.html

Take for instance the Atlantic Wolffish (Anarhichas lupus) a species of increasing concern in the Gulf of Maine, if fact they are likely to be soon added to the Endangered Species Act. They are a wonderful (dare I say beautiful) fish with some great characteristics and a face only a mother, or a crazy marine biologist, could love! They feed mainly on molluscs, crustaceans and echinoderms using their huge canines. They are a large benthic fish, growing up to 5 feet and weighing up to 40 pounds.

They are also a slow growing and late maturing species. Growth and maturity varies with temperature fluctuations, but generally they are reproductively mature by 6 years or about 16 inches total length. Spawning pairs of male and female form in the spring with actual spawning period varying, possibly as a function of temperature. As with many species, reproductive success increases as females grow larger and older, producing both more eggs and more viable eggs (ranges from 5,000 to 12,000 eggs per season). The female lays her eggs in holes and around boulder reefs. The male then begins a fast, loses his teeth, and guards the eggs for four to nine months of egg incubation (again a function of temperature). Four to nine month fasting and guarding the eggs. Think about that one guys!

wolffish pair from CLF (credit: Jonathan Bird) on Vimeo.

One of the cool things about wolffish is the presence of anti-freeze in their body, which allows them to survive, even thrive, in extremely cold waters. In the wild they have been caught in trawl surveys in waters from -1.9°C to 14°C. In the laboratory they survived temperatures as high as 17°C, but feeding was strongly negatively correlated with the higher temperatures.

So temperature is a major factor on the wolffish, but so is habitat. Wolffish are most often found in rocky reefs or seaweed beds on hard substrate from 80m to 180m depths, but range as deep as 650m and can, on occasion, be found in coastal shallows. My most memorable dive in New England remains being about 3 feet away from a 4 foot wolffish in the cove just off Avery Point in late November.

Young wolffish keep to the deeper, colder part of their range where temperatures remain -1°C to 4°C. Only mature fish are found in shallower ranges and higher temperatures with an upper temperature limit of 10°C.

My thoughts recently have related mainly to mapping the current and potential future ranges of some of these animals using habitat suitability modeling techniques in geographic information systems (GIS), including especially ecological niche factor analysis (ENFA). Using what we know of their habitat requirements (for the wolffish: -1°C-10°C, boulder reefs for spawning, 80m-200m depth, and abundance of lobster, crab, urchin or molluscs) we can map the current optimal and sub-optimal ranges. It doesn’t mean they’ll be there, but it is where the potential for finding them should be highest, based on our understanding of their requirements. By altering the temperature and depth components to match forecasts based on climate change models, we can look ahead to forecast the likely range of the animals, and even the decade by decade march or retreat of suitable habitat.

An example of using mulitple habitat factors with multipliers to determine ecological niche. From http://www2.unil.ch/biomapper/

For some animals the outlook is pretty bleak. The combination of habitat requirements and temperature requirements will drive them completely out of the Gulf of Maine and potentially out of the Western Atlantic entirely. There are many fish that are at their breeding temperature limits in the Gulf of Maine already, including many commercially important species. Some marine animals are existing in virtual islands of suitable habitat formed by complexities of depth, substrate type and complexity, currents and temperature, among many other factors.

The challenge is to identify, for each species or community, which of these factors are most important for both the organism’s survival and our modeling efforts. Unfortunately, especially in the marine realm, there is still so much we don’t know about the ecological requirements of may of the animals and communities. Even mapping the seafloor at resolutions comparable to our maps of terrestrial areas continues to be challenge. It often surprises many people I talk to when they find out that almost all our knowledge of marine animal populations and habitat characteristics comes from commercial fisheries and from sample trawls by the NMFS. Most species that are not targets of fisheries or considered commercially important have not been studied extensively, if at all.

Trawler bringin up it's haul - from http://en.wikivisual.com/images/f/fb/Fish_on_Trawler.jpg

In the marine environment it is very challenging to accurately predict how communities will respond to warming waters and how individual species ranges will change, simply from lack of direct observation. We are getting better at using the important data we do have, and have identified proxies for the data we simply do not have, but we need more time in the water with ROV’s and DSV’s for direct observations, especially of the continental shelf and deep sea ecosystems.

Wolffish eating a sea urchin from CLF (credit: Jonathan Bird) on Vimeo.

References

Burreson, E., & Ford, S. (2004). A review of recent information on the Haplosporidia, with special reference
to Haplosporidium nelsoni (MSX disease) Aquating Living Resources, 17 (4), 499-517 DOI: 10.1051/alr:2004056

Hagen, N., & Mann, K.H. (1992). Functional response of the predators American lobster Homarus americanus (Milne-Edwards) and Atlantic wolffish Anarhichas lupus (L.) to increasing numbers of the green sea urchin Strongylocentrotus droebachiensis (Müller) Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology, 159 (1), 89-112 DOI: 10.1016/0022-0981(92)90260-H

Jonasson, J., Thorarinsdottir, G., Eiriksson, H., & Marteinsdottir, G. (2004). Temperature tolerance of Iceland scallop, Chlamys islandica (O.F. Muller) under controlled experimental conditions Aquaculture Research, 35 (15), 1405-1414 DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2109.2004.01159.x

King, M.J., Kao, M.H., Brown, J.A, & Fletcher, G.L. (1989). Lethal freezing temperatures of fish:
limitations to seapen culture in Atlantic Canada. Proc Ann Aquacult Assoc Can., 89 (3), 47-49

Ordás, M., & Figueras, A. (1998). In vitro culture of Perkinsus atlanticus, a parasite of the carpet shell clam Ruditapes decussatus Diseases of Aquatic Organisms, 33, 129-136 DOI: 10.3354/dao033129

One last awesome video of a wolffish!

Wolffish devouring a crab from CLF (credit: Jonathan Bird) on Vimeo.

All my life I have struggled to overcome negative exposure to sharks. I think I have won, but it has been a long haul.

My earliest memory of sharks is from 1975. I was spending the night at a friend’s house. Across the street from his building was the base movie theater. All that Friday night we were scared witless by the constant screams we heard coming out of that theater during the three showings. We had seen the posters on the movie theater billboard and our imaginations filled in all the rest, which is not too hard for imaginative 7–year–olds. It would be years later before I actually saw the movie, which only reinforced my abject fear of sharks.

Fortunately, my folks exposed me to National Geographic and the Cousteau Society, so I was also exposed to sharks as amazing animals and important parts of the ecosystem. Yet, whenever we’d visit the coast and go swimming, in the back of my mind I would worry about the sharks. As an adult in the Caribbean, I was revisited by that fear when I began diving. I have to admit my greatest concern when I began diving was that I was entering their realm. I slowly got over that fear (mostly) as I got more dives under my belt, including several dives with reef and nurse sharks. Then came Somalia.

In Somalia there was a strict order not to swim in the beautiful waters around Mogadishu. I have to tell you it is VERY tempting to take a small dip in the water to escape the equatorial heat, especially when you’ve been riding convoys in full battle gear and are caked in sweat, dust, and dirt. A moment of wading in cool salt water to escape it all was very inviting. I wanted nothing more, but the order was there for a reason. In a little over a year 6 UNOSOM workers were bit by sharks in Mogadishu. Three died of their injuries. I knew Mogadishu was a unique place for the sharks. The area had become a rich hunting ground for them, thanks in part to a history of townspeople throwing carrion and refuse into the waters nearby. Eventually the UN installed a shark fence around the beaches at the airport. I wonder if it’s still there.

To the south in Kismayo, I did a couple dives with several sharks in the area. My job was to keep an eye out for sharks while the underwater specialists carried out their jobs. I was pretty scared, but I was young and dumb and diving with a bunch of seriously gung–ho types, so I wasn’t about to admit it. The funny thing is the sharks were there, but their behavior was very non-threatening, even the largest of them. They occasionally came into view, swam lazily at a distance, then receded back into the blue. They were not terribly interested in us or our activities.

I continue to dive, even in the “dive by touch” conditions that the locals call “high visibility” in Long Island Sound. I have studied sharks a bit more and the critical part that many sharks play as part of their ecosystem. Intellectually, I know that even as a diver and someone who works in the marine environment, I am less likely to be bitten by a shark than I am to be struck by lighting or electrocuted by my toaster. Yet, in the back of my mind, there is still a little kernel of concern. When I see the replica of the great white in the cafe on campus (caught just outside of Long Island Sound), or I hear of the juvenile great white found in the estuary near here, I find myself having to shake off that fear and refocus my thoughts.

I have been fortunate to see sharks up close in the wild and I realize that they are not the killing machines that the media often portrays them as. Even the Discovery Channel uses sensationalism and fear to sell their Shark Week. I haven’t watched Shark Week for several years, since I was disgusted by their inaccurate and sensationalistic portrayal of sharks the last time I did watch. Shark Week then was about 80% fear and sensationalism, 15% interesting factoids, and 5% conservation, proactive education, and recent science. The shame is that Shark Week could be a force for genuine education about shark conservation and the importance of sharks in the ecosystem.

I certainly hope that they have changed their portrayal of sharks, especially since the sharks are in desperate need of our help. Even Peter Benchley, the author of Jaws, expressed his deep regret over having written Jaws after the damage it caused.

“Knowing what I know now, I could never write that book today,” said Benchley, who also co-wrote the screenplay for “Jaws.” “Sharks don’t target human beings, and they certainly don’t hold grudges.”

Unfortunately, with shows such as “Deadly Waters” and “Sharkbite Summer” in the lineup, it doesn’t look likely. I could take a very optimistic view and hope that “Deadly Waters” is describing the terrible daily massacre of sharks for shark fin soup. Maybe “Sharkbite Summer” is about us putting the figurative bite on sharks. But as far as the Shark Week advertising and show titles go on the Discovery Channel website, the message is still all about fear.

I mean really, how far have we come in 34 years??

The 1975 film poster for Jaws

and 34 years later, the 'Web Poster' for Shark Week 2009

Then 500 feet before the exit for the museum our right rear tire blew out. Isn’t that funny? Twenty minutes later, Eric was able to get the spare tire off from the underside of the car. The mechanism that held the tire in place froze up and Eric couldn’t get the tire off. I didn’t expect anyone to stop and help us, but I did find it highly annoying that people kept honking at us and making wow–it–stinks–to–be–you faces as they drove by.

Eric got the old tire off by jumping on top of the lug wrench for each lug nut and got the spare on. The spare tire looked a little flat, but we thought we might at least make it to the museum on it. Wrong! The spare tire completely separated from the rim when we tried to drive away. Eric announced that we are getting cell phones as soon as we get home.

By this time we had been stranded on the side of the road at least 40 minutes. The only police car we saw on the road in that time passed us by. Wasn’t that nice? So we decided to hoof it. We walked down the slope of the exit behind us and found a tile company showroom. The ladies in there were extremely nice in letting us use the phone and the bathroom. They even offered us drinks and we took them up on a bottle of water. We called USAA roadside assistance. Thank goodness we had them to call!

We’ve never had to use the roadside assistance before. USAA is the best! They helped us find the nearest towing and tire places, called the towing company and told them where we were, and called a taxi for us. Eric went to the nearest ATM so we’d have cash for the taxi. Johann and I went to the museum. Eric waited with the car and met up with us at the museum later.

I’m so proud of Eric. The tow truck driver was smoking on the ride to the tire place. Pairing that with the stressful events of the day, Eric was the most tempted to bum a cigarette then than in any other moment since he quit smoking two and a half years ago and he didn’t. He waited nearly an hour for the tow truck and made the 15 minute ride to the tire place in heavy traffic. Once Eric paid for new tires and learned it would be a three hour wait, he got the mechanics to look up a taxi service, which they grudgingly did, and came to the museum.

Johann and I had already gone over everything we wanted to see and had done some shopping in the museum store. The third floor had a section on minerals and gems, an Egyptian exhibit with two mummies, dioramas with taxidermy animals native to Connecticut, and the Earth and Space section. We went back into the Darwin exhibit to make a few sketches of some of the skeletons there and watched the short film on Darwin, Dana, and Marsh again at the entrance of the exhibit. By 3:30 P.M., we were getting tired and hungry, so we decided to go sit in the Great Hall and wait for Eric. A few minutes later we saw him on the second floor looking down on us from the Discovery Room!

Johann and I pulled Eric in different directions to show and share with him everything he had missed while we were at the museum. Eric was a good sport, took some pictures, and walked around with us. Johann wasn’t truly excited or happy about our trip to the museum until Daddy was there. Except for the few times we got lost in what we saw and read about in the sections of the museum that were new to us, I was distracted with worry too.

Once we had made the rounds the second time with Eric, we walked to the nearest restaurant and got sandwiches and ice cream. The waitress kindly dialed the number of the cab service we’d used before. I was a little concerned when I noticed smoke from the engine coming out of the air vents. Somehow the taxi got us there. We got back to the tire place 10 minutes before they closed. The car was already repaired and waiting. The mechanic saw us come up and he met us at the door with Eric’s car keys. A day that could have been a total disaster turned out pretty well. So we took the scenic route to get to the museum. Thankfully, the rain stopped BEFORE the car broke down!

Torosaurus latus bronze in front of the Yale Peabody Museum

Johann studying and sketching part of the Darwin Exhibit on evolution while Tammy studies the exhibit on Dana.

Johann and Tammy discussing Hesperonis crassipes

Johann was fascinated by the Hesperonis crassipes skeleton.

Another favorite, Moeritherium, a prehistoric mammal that Johann identifies almost as a friend.

Alas Poor Erectus…

Normally cold, rainy days are so dreary, but not when you get to go to the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History! We desperately needed a family science immersion day to rejuvenate! Eric took the day off. I had hoped to get some yard work done, but that wasn’t going to happen with the rain. So we decided to buy membership to the Yale Peabody Museum and go. They have a reciprocity agreement with a lot of other science museums and centers. We have plans to go to all the ones we are interested in while we are still on the East Coast, especially the Museum of Science in Boston, so we now have two years to take advantage of the membership benefits.

At the Yale Peabody Museum there are three floors, but we only managed to cover the first floor, the Discovery Room for children on the second floor, and the gift shop in the four hours we were there. We will go back to see the third floor and view the Darwin exhibit again before it comes down August 23. Johann didn’t want to validate the parking ticket so that we couldn’t get the car out of the parking lot. He figured if that happened, we would have to stay at the museum overnight, maybe even indefinitely!

The exhibit “Darwin: 150 Years of Evolutionary Thinking” was very well done. There was information on Dana and Marsh as well, and it was very interesting to see the similarities between Darwin and Dana, who has been referred to as the American Darwin. Some of the correspondence between the two scientists was on display, as well as a map of the sea voyages each man went on as part of their path of scientific discovery.

The Hall of Dinosaurs and the Hall of Mammalian Evolution were amazing. Eric and I enjoyed seeing the wonder in Johann’s eyes and watching him soak it all in. We all kept thinking about the movie Night at the Museum while we were looking at the dinosaurs. Johann loved to see real examples of the animals he’s studied in his books.

Johann was also very excited to see everything in the “Fossil Fragments: The Riddle of Human Origins” exhibit. He recognized the discoveries that were written about and the specimens on display from the documentary shows he’s seen on the Leaky family’s work. He took time to draw sketches and make notes. The Age of Reptiles mural and the Age of Mammals mural were incredible. Since Eric was permitted to take pictures without a flash, we are going over the pictures of the fossils and can even read some of the information about them again.

The Yale Peabody Museum has a good interactive exhibit about energy conservation right now. We also enjoyed the smaller sections where the Hall of Pacific Cultures, Hall of Native American Cultures, and the scale model of Machu Picchu are. The Discovery Room has a leaf cutter ant colony, a black rat snake, and poison dart frogs. There were drawers full of fossils, rocks and minerals, and various preserved spiders and insects that each had a magnifying glass and a please touch policy. They had a variety of stuffed birds and preserved butterflies for kids to see. There were lots of books out for kids to read and a display comparing eggs from different birds. Johann particularly liked holding the cast of the T.rex tooth and the coprolite.

There was so much to see and learn in every room we went into, that even though we spent four hours there, we still feel like we missed some of it. Where some of the homeschooling families use their vacation time to go to the Creationist Museum, we prefer to revel in places like the Yale Peabody Museum. Now that we’ve gone, we might just have to make a weekly pilgrimage there!

The Johnson Sea Link II being deployed from the R/V Seward Johnson for Life on the Edge 2005

Some people question the real need for manned submersibles, arguing that ROV‘s like Hercules, Jason and Kraken II can do anything a manned vehicle can do, only better and safer. It’s a valid question, and one that needs to be repeatedly asked, especially as more advanced ROV’s designed from the ground up for science come on line. But my answer today is that there is a need for both of them still. ROVs can not go everywhere an HOV can, and their mobility and responsiveness are limited, compared to HOVs, by the ever-present tether to the mother ship. An ROV also lacks the ability to provide 3D visual-spatial analysis and true in-situ contextual observations which only a scientist and pilot on the spot can provide, at least with todays technology. ROV’s while extremely capable are still a telepresence technology, and many of those that have used both HOVs and ROVs, such as Dr. Craig McClain at Deep Sea News, attest that something significant is lost in that translation.

These experiences combined to give me a first hand knowledge of an environment, that previously I had only studied remotely. I studied the deep sea for three years before my first deep dive and my understanding, although incomplete, of this environment has radically changed since those dives in the JSL.

Perhaps more important, these manned submersibles stir the imaginations of young minds, leading them, like me, to dream abut exploring the sea, maybe one day sitting in awe within a submersible 1 kilometer below the surface, surrounded by organisms we are still only beginning to comprehend fully.

Please help us let those in control of the JSLs fate aware of the JSLs importance to science and to our ability to understand the seas and stir the imaginations of the young explorers in our midst. Young explorers like Johann. Please GO SIGN A PETITION TO STOP THEIR LOSS.

So, a bit more on the new NOAA Cooperative Institute, since that also directly affects my future. NURC-NA&GL, along with all the other NURC centers, are NOAA supported, non-federal organizations under NOAA’s National Undersea Research Program (NURP). NURC-NA&GL’s mission is as a center for excellence in research related to the North Atlantic and Great Lakes region. They work with NOAA scientists on long term research goals including developing oceanographic research technologies (such as the Kraken II), fisheries and conservation research, historical site identification and documentation along with major outreach efforts. They are also tasked with Postdoc and graduate student training to provide the next generation of oceanographers. Unfortunately NURC-NA&GL may lose all NOAA funding with the establishment of the new center at HBOI, as it will replace the four existing East Coast NURC centers, including the one at UCONN. Personally I think cutting support for the existing centers is a mistake, even though the new Cooperative Institute sounds wonderful.

So my summer and the next two years are set, sort of. There are still some questions (second year funding, nailing down the thesis topic, now that we have health insurance, do we have another baby, etc., etc.), but at least the path forward is clear enough to begin charging down it! The summer will be hectic, split between two projects for NURC (video and GIS outreach products for high school teachers and students to use and possibly video highlights from a recent deep sea cruise), two projects for Prof. A. (both habitat related), a cruise for Prof. A, and then the remainder of my time will be dedicated to finishing up an outreach book and cards for grades K-12+ on molluscs. Whew!

*Johann pointed out that even Playmobil recognizes the JSLs and their full sphere compartments as the iconic submersible.

What is your iconic research submersible? Is it Human operated or remote?

Whatever it is, please do Sign the petition to keep the JSLs operating.

Check out the Deep Sea News collection of JSL videos.

zooplankton = wonder
Originally uploaded by eclectic echoes.

Making plankton.
Originally uploaded by eclectic echoes.

Let ‘em float!
Originally uploaded by eclectic echoes.

A menagerie in Marzipan.
Originally uploaded by eclectic echoes.

13 choices for Which Critter is Best.
Originally uploaded by eclectic echoes.

A beach combing scavenger hunt.
Originally uploaded by eclectic echoes.

Taking inventory of the scavenger hunt.
Originally uploaded by eclectic echoes.

Dolphin Batik Tote Bag
Originally uploaded by eclectic echoes.

Party Favors for all!!
Originally uploaded by eclectic echoes.

What a great day! Everything went well, we had beautiful weather, and everyone had fun. What more could we ask for? Johann wanted to have an ocean–themed party, but when I started planning activities, I quickly realized there was no way we could do it at our house with our space limitations.

We looked at a number of places around town and finally decided on Project Oceanology at Avery Point. They have fantastic oceanography education programs for kids and I thought that maybe they did parties too, so I checked their website. Since their programs are for 4th grade and up, having a party there was a great opportunity to do something for younger kids.

Johann chose the party option entitled “Plankton Pandemonium”. Emily was the young lady who did the activities with the kids and she was great! She got a sample of plankton and put out petri dishes at a number of microscopes so everyone had a chance to see the plankton. There was also a video of plankton the kids could watch. Then the kids made their own “plankton” out of mesh fabric, coffee filters, yarn scraps, feathers, pom-poms, etc.

Since Project O is in a two–story building with an open staircase, once the crafting was done, we held plankton races. All the kids went upstairs and when Emily gave the signal, they dropped their plankton creations. There had to be two heats, because of the number of kids there, and then a tie breaker race. Because plankton have to float to stay alive, the winner of the race was the one who’s plankton stayed afloat the longest.

While Emily prepared the second activity for the kids, we had cupcakes and ice cream. Johann loved having Happy Birthday sung to him. Once he blew out his number 9 candle on one of the cupcakes, I put the platter with all the marzipan cupcakes on the table. All the kids had the roundest, big saucer eyes I’d ever seen! Some of the moms asked me if I was in business making cake decorations and that I should be if I wasn’t. One said the marzipan was too beautiful to eat. Eric explained what each creature was and then everyone chose what they wanted. We chose invertebrates that the kids might not have seen before, to show them there is much more in the ocean besides the high profile fish and cetaceans everyone is familiar with.

Since the weather held, we were able to do the scavenger hunt at the small beach near the Project O building. The kids divided up into teams, got their plastic bins, checklists, and beachcombing guides, and jumped right in! Once the teams had everything on the list that they could find, Emily discussed each item with the kids, explaining more about the animals and answering any questions. Eric said it was a good thing that we had the outdoor activity right after the sugar rush of the cupcakes and ice cream! All the kids had loads of fun exploring on the beach.

Then it was time to open presents. Johann liked everything he got. They were surprised when we gave out our party favor gifts. Eric, Johann, and I dyed the blank tote bags using Eric’s copper dolphin chop and soy wax. We got each child their own copy of The Ocean Book, Aquarium and Seaside Activities and Ideas for All Ages, a small all–weather notebook for writing down observations, an ocean creatures pencil, and an orca eraser.

In answering questions and compliments, I explained to the moms why we chose Project O and why we did everything we did for the party. Johann said he loves the ocean so much that he wanted to share that with all of his friends. And since this is the first birthday party he’s ever had for friends, we wanted to make it extra special. Johann thanked us for the party on the way home in the car. He said it was the best day of his life.

The adults learned just as much from the party as the kids did. An audible “wow” came from the group when Emily told them that phytoplankton is responsible for most of the oxygen we breathe. We helped instill a new appreciation for the ocean and the organisms that live there. Hopefully from now on when the kids are at the beach or they think about the ocean, they will look at everything in a whole new way.

“Look, Mommy! Look at the holes they left! There’s less and less. You can see where they swam through! They’re swimming around and around. They are swirling around and swimming in at all angles! It’s a feeding frenzy!!”

Johann watched and recorded what he saw through the microscope after I added a drop of dyed yeast to a sample of paramecia. He had a fantastic afternoon viewing all the live protozoa cultures we ordered. His favorites were the ciliates: paramecia and stentor. Those paramecia are voracious eaters!

For me, today was that day.

Ah, the beauty of Avery Point and the Castle blanketed in a layer of calming white snow. Until the klaxon sounds and sirens wail.

Just to hit the high spots:
Very tired this morning after insomniatic night -> Roads not plowed -> three car pile up on the highway -> highway traffic diverted onto my commute route -> 15 minute commute (+15 for unplowed streets) now takes 57 minutes -> miss Chemistry lecture.

Trying to pack for Ft. Lauderdale trip interupted by two 20 minute fire alarms, both false alarms! Finally got the three crates full of the nav and video systems for the cruise, they are on the way. Hopefully they make it to Ft. Lauderdale and don’t end up in Ft. Leavenworth.

One of three hook and ladder trucks which responds to every Marine Science building alarm. I don’t mean that to imply that there are a lot of alarms.

Laptop died at ~8:40am -> three major projects, all due in next 1-3 weeks on dead laptiop, not to mention three almost complete web site redesigns I figured to complete while on the plane. Fortunately it’s only the video board -> after school Tammy and sick Johann accompany (very tired) me to Genius Bar where they verify, yes it’s the NVidea board. They have replacement mainboard in stock, 3-4 days to replace. Whew! Excellent Indian food from the food court(!!) as celebration.

I managed to get the projects off the laptop before we left for Providence by booting it blind as a firewire harddrive to the iMac. Slow process, but at least I’m safe there. 2 hours sleep in the past 48. This day.. you can have it back (though I’ll keep the vindaloo and nan in the food court, thank you!) Now to sleep perchance to dream, or if not just forget this day.

Dr. McClain over at Deep Sea News recently published a very readable open access paper at PLoS ONE about the potential connectedness of seamounts and nearby habitats. I love that the paper was highly accessible, both in the writing and the fact that anyone can download it from PLoS One and read it for free, especially since, in the case of Davidson Seamount and Monterey Canyon, there are significant implications on management policies, if the goal is to protect and preserve the diversity within the canyon.

A Little Closer to Home

Tim Shank and his lab have been doing a lot of work on connectivity, including genetic analysis, among and between the seamounts of the North Atlantic, especially the New England Seamounts and the Corner Rise Seamounts. Though I haven’t seen any papers yet (I believe Walter Cho is working on this for his Ph.D.) what I have been exposed to is that they are finding connectivity between seamounts and seamount areas, but it is a complex situation with very different connectivity from one species to the next, one depth to the next and one region to the next. Connectivity factors likely include reproduction and recruitment strategies, bathymetry, depth, habitat availability, and hydrodynamics (regional and local).

So Why Should We Care?

Ultimately understanding how these deep sea ecosystems are interconnected is critical for conservation and management of marine resources, including potentially many commercially important species (and the deep sea cephalopods who lay egg capsules on the deep corals, thank you very much!). It needs to be studied further to understand the extent of the connectivity. Connectivity studies have a significant number of challenges though, not the least of which is the seemingly simple task of identifying the interaction time and space scales of the relevant processes. In part these define the boundaries of populations. Identifying all the species using traditional morphological taxonomy and molecular techniques, can be a herculean task as well.

Unfortunately, the seamounts are also being impacted by deep sea fishing. Trawling across the mounts can remove entire communities of slow growing deep sea corals and the complex communities they support, potentially causing a significant effect on the deep sea coral community connectivity as well.

My Tiny Personal Connection

This last year I have been working part time with video captured on several deep sea cruises to the New England Seamount Chain and the Corner Rise Seamounts. Much of the work has been producing support video and a DVD for a variety of presentations, which I can’t present here. I can, however, finally show one piece of the package I put together, which was the last piece we did to give to the funding partners.

Your Seamounts on Fishing

The Future?

While I loved deep sea biology and invert communities before, spending many hours scouring HD video of these invert communities helped really hook me on the idea of studying them long term. As I watched the communities of inverts on the screen I had so many questions about their distribution, their physiological adaptations, limitations on growth and distribution, recruitment triggers, etc… etc… etc. I would love to be able to study these communities, the larval distribution, development and recruitment for the communities and individual species, and the ecological and anthropogenic pressures on these communities.

(Yes, I would still also love to study cephalopods and larval development and ecology within the mangroves, still lot’s of wake-me-up-in-the-middle-of-the-night questions there too!)

Notes

All footage in the piece was taken on the 2005 Deep Atlantic Stepping Stones mission, but not necessarily from the same dive or on the same seamount. The final sequence is the result of an otter door impacting and dragging across a part of the Kükenthal Seamount. An otter-door is a large metal rudder that holds the trawl nets wide open.

There is more impact footage from the mission, including trash and meters upon meters of clean parallel lines cut through communities of coral and sponges where the rollers on the bottom of the net rolled through. The otter door impact zone, however, was the starkest example of clearing the communities from the seamount in the video I surveyed, devastating damage.

Sources and Further Reading

Peter J. Auster, Jon Moore, Kari B. Heinonen, Les Watling (2005). A habitat classification scheme for seamount landscapes: assessing the functional role of deep-water corals as fish habitat. Cold-Water Corals and Ecosystems, 761-769 DOI: 10.1007/3-540-27673-4_40

Craig R. McClain, Lonny Lundsten, Micki Ream, James Barry, Andrew DeVogelaere (2009). Endemicity, Biogeography, Composition, and Community Structure On a Northeast Pacific Seamount PLoS ONE, 4 (1) DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0004141

Rhian Waller, Les Watling, Peter Auster, Timothy Shank (2007). Anthropogenic impacts on the Corner Rise seamounts, north-west Atlantic Ocean Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the UK, 87 (05) DOI: 10.1017/S0025315407057785

Even though we showed him how a statically charged balloon will light up a compact fluorescent bulb when held up to it, he had yet to see a big enough charge that threw a spark on its own. He had played with the classic experiment of dragging his socked feet on the rug in order to shock both of us, but that was still something you couldn’t see. He knew it was there because you could feel it. I wanted him to see it too and I wasn’t sure he believed me that you could under the right conditions. This was beyond frustrating.

About a month ago I was doing one last load of laundry before bed. Eric and Johann were getting into their pjs in the bathroom where it’s warmer. I was in the bedroom folding the white polyester blanket. Since I’d run out of fabric softener, it was more staticky than usual. I heard a couple of good crackles as I started to pull it apart and realize this was my chance to show Johann.

I ran and got Eric and Johann, we turned out the lights, and then I pulled the folds of the blanket apart. It was a fairy fireworks display! The moment I was waiting for finally happened. Johann not only saw it, but got big round eyes and had a sense of wonder and awe on his face. “Whoa! That’s really cool, Mommy!”

We played with the blanket until it seemed like all the static was gone, but then by shaking the blanket, we were able to generate more static electricity. Eric got into it and at Johann’s urging, kept shaking it more and more to make more sparks. Eric brought the blanket high as he was shaking it and I noticed the ceiling light flickered.

Eric did it again for Johann to see. The same compact fluorescent light bulb lit up. You could see the light inside the coil was the same purple-blue light of the sparks. Eric continued to shake and lift the blanket to try to get more of the light bulbs in the ceiling light to turn on. At that point I could feel the hairs on my face standing on end and started getting an apprehensive feeling that we were generating too much of a charge. So I suggested we stop.

We let the charge die down, but Johann’s enthusiasm for our static experiment hadn’t. He didn’t want to stop. So Eric did one more run on everything. When the charge got to be as high as before, he stopped again. The whole room felt electrified. Then I noticed the air smelled so clean like a magnified post thunderstorm sky in the mountains. The last time I’d smelled that smell was years ago when we had used an ionizer in our livingroom that didn’t shut off when it was supposed to. Bedtime had passed over an hour before, but that didn’t matter. Johann’s skepticism had been replaced with scientific wonder. I don’t think any of us will look at the white blanket quite the same again.