Monday, we met Dr. Judkins and learned about different open ocean studies and methods that have been used in the Gulf of Mexico. We talked about the different methods we would be using to collect data on the R/V Weatherbird II in preparation for Tuesday. My favorite part of the day was learning about Dr. Judkins's deep sea research on cephalopods, since that is similar what I want to do research on in grad school.
Tuesday, we took a research trip on the R/V Weatherbird II to collect data on an offshore site during the day and an inshore site at night. I absolutely loved being on a boat all day to collect data and having the opportunity to use the equipment on the vessel. We learned how to deploy a CTD to collect water quality data, a Neuston net to collect surface plankton, a Bongo net to collect plankton just under the surface of the water, an Otter trawl to collect specimens from just above the bottom, and a Capetown dredge to collect benthic specimens. We split into groups to deploy each device, and I was in the group that deployed the offshore CTD during the day and the inshore Otter trawl at night. My favorite part of Tuesday was helping with the trawls then sorting and IDing inverts from the trawls, especially when I IDed the only squid we caught all day, the Doryteuthis sp. which was put into the freezer to confirm the ID in the lab the next day.
Pictures from aboard the R/V Weatherbird II
Wednesday, we split into groups to clean up the lab, clean up data from the research cruise on Tuesday, and confirm IDs of specimens that we couldn't fully determine on the cruise. Thankfully, I was on the ID group and I was able to use Dr. Judkins's copy of a cephalopod dichotomous key to help me figure out the species of the squid, which was definitely one of my favorite experiences from the whole class. I've used sections of dichotomous keys to figure out the species of animals before in labs, but this time I had the freedom to do it all on my own (asking Dr. Judkins for help when needed, of course) without having everything completely set up for me, and I loved it. The rest of the day was looking at plankton from our plankton nets, building our own plankton for a plankton race, and brainstroming research questions we could use to analyze the data we had collected on Tuesday.
Pictures from IDing the squid
Thursday morning we worked on analyzing our data from Tuesday using research questions that we picked on Wednesday, as well as putting together a presentation on our findings. Chris and I teamed up to tackle the analysis of species diversity from otter trawls done in 2013 and 2018 at the pre-determined offshore and inshore locations that we collected data at. After breaking for lunch, we stopped our presentation work for the day and traveled to the Florida Aquarium in Tampa to explore and perform ethograms on animals at the aquarium to analyze their behavior. I chose to do my ethograms on a type of duck in the wetlands exhibit, a pacific blue tang in a small tank toward the beginning of the aquarium, and a slippery dick fish in a wrasse exhibit near the main coral reef tank. I thought this part of the day was interesting, since I had never done behavior analysis on animals before. Then, we were left to explore the rest of the aquarium for as long as we liked. After exploring a bit, Amanda (our TA) came up to me and said she needed to show me something. I immediately perked up and practically skipped along with her, because I had a feeling I knew what she was about to show me. By now, everyone on the trip knows that I love cephalopods and they're what I want to research in grad school, so no matter who it is, they'll yell for me if they see even an octopus t-shirt. As we walked further, Amanda's smile got bigger and I started walking faster. Then we finally came up on the exhibit for Wilson, the Florida Aquarium's giant Pacific octopus. I couldn't stop smiling and staring at the tank because I had never seen an octopus that big in person, and it's easy to say that this may have been one of my top three favorite moments in the entire class (along with snorkeling Looe Key in the Florida Keys and IDing the squid on Wednesday).
Picture of me and Wilson the giant Pacific octopus at the Florida Aquarium
Friday started off with us wrapping up our power points for our presentations, then we all took turns presenting our findings in a peer-review style session so that we could give each other constructive criticism. Chris and I did our presentation on the species diversity in the years of 2013 and 2018, then comparing the species diversity from our data collection from these two years. We thought that yearly, when comparing offshore and inshore sites, offshore species diversity would be slightly higher than inshore. Also, we thought that from 2013 and 2018 data from our two sites each year in total, species diversity would decrease from 2013 to 2018. We analyzed our data using the Shannon Diversity Index and found that in 2013, there is no significant difference between species diversities of the offshore and inshore sites. In 2018, the inshore site's species diversity was significantly greater than the offshore site's, possibly due to the lack of proper doors for the otter trawl and twisting of the net offshore. When comparing 2013 to 2018, more specimens were recorded from 2018, but the species diversity for 2013 was significantly greater than that in 2018. This is probably due to close to half of the specimens from 2018 being composed of iridescent swimming crabs. Our presentation seemed to go fairly well, and it was nice to hear feedback from everyone else in the class on how we could improve for future presentations. Listening to the rest of the class present was also nice because it helped the class improve as a whole and get ideas on how to present better in the future.
After our presentations, we took our post test and said goodbye to open ocean week. Honestly, this week was possibly my favorite week in the class considering all that we learned and were able to do this week. It was sad to have to leave USFSP, but at the same time I'm excited to head back to my home institution in Pensacola and see what we we have planned to do in my local area for the last week of the course.
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