Week 5 - UWF - Emily Birdsall

Photo Credit: Dr. Barbara 

It's hard to believe that these exhausting, wonderful 5 weeks have come to an end. It has been such an awesome experience to travel the state and learn about so many different Florida ecosystems with 15 great people! I have learned so much about my state, and  feel even more confident in the career path that I have chosen for myself. I am grateful for the new friendships that were made, and of course all of the fun that we had together!

The sign at the entrance to the EPA
Photo by me

For the last week, we headed up to UWF in Pensacola. I had never been to Pensacola before, so I was pretty excited to check out a new part of the state. The landscape is so different from what I grew up with and what we have in St. Pete.

Taking water quality with the YSI
Photo Credit: Lisa Rose-Mann

The focus of this week was on water quality analysis. On Monday, we spent the morning driving to different areas of the Pensacola bay watershed, starting at the headwaters and ending at Bayou Tahar. At every site, we explored the landscape and interesting features of the area.



We took water samples with the YSI, which measures temperature, dissolved oxygen, conductivity, and pH. We also used a Secchi Disk to measure turbidity and water depth. In the afternoon, we had the opportunity to visit the EPA office in Pensacola. I absolutely loved this experience! We got some really good insight as to what sort of government jobs are available to us, and what we need to do to get there.

Tuesday morning we finished water quality at various locations around Pensacola, and then spent the afternoon in the lab to process the water samples that we had gathered throughout the course. It was really interesting to filter the water and see the differences on the filters between the different parts of the state. We then began counting the microplastics that were present from each sample. While I don't usually enjoy working with microscopes, I really enjoyed this activity. Dr. Janisak was awesome at helping me to identify the microplastics and answering all of my questions.

Looking for shorebirds in the dunes
Photo Credit: Amanda Schaaf

Wednesday morning was spent learning about different methods of measuring submerged ground water discharge and conducting seagrass samples. I loved snorkeling in the seagrass beds and seeing schools of fish come up to investigate my feet. After lunch, we headed back into the lab to finish up counting microplastics and water quality tests.
Thursday morning we went to Pensacola beach to conduct shorebird surveys. We were hoping to see some nesting black skimmers, however we didn't see any. We did however see some adorable least tern chicks. We used receivers to find radio transmitters that had been hidden in the sand, to give us an idea of how difficult it can be to locate tagged birds.

A microbead found in a water sample from Vilano Beach
Photo by me

Friday was presentation day for the final projects. Our group presented on the microplastics that were found in the water samples. We also tested the correlation between the number of microplastics with temperature and salinity. We did not get any correlations, but it was awesome to see how everything that we had been working on came together.

This class has such an amazing opportunity to expand my skills and learn about so many different career options within the field of marine biology. I am so grateful for this opportunity, and I would like to sincerely thank everyone who made this a possibility!