Baby corals - Feeding!

Big news today - four of my baby corals have developed their
tentacles and are feeding (once I quickly defrosted the frozen 'coral
food' (plankton) I had for them - I wasn't quite ready yet!). Looking
back at my notes these corals are feeding ~3-4 days earlier than the
last cruise I was on.........so keep all those fingers crossed for
them to weather out this storm we're in and get building skeletons!

And - we did just manage to do a trawl - no coral, but some cute
anemones! Another one about to go in too, about the only thing we can
do right now and the waves are building, so probably not for much
longer.

Station F....and holding....

Lat - 67'S 02.32
Long - 69'W 55.04
Water Depth - 646m

We're at Station F and in a holding pattern, the weather has come on
down and it's too windy, wavy and wet out there for us to do any work
outside. The movies have apparently been pretty much non-stop all day
in the lounge. I just watched the end of Days of Thunder.....haven't
seen that one in a while! We're surveying right now for weather to
see if we can do some trawling - you can trawl in pretty bad weather
as it's not as sensitive to the swell as coring or using the camera -
so hopefully we will be able to get some work done on this shift. The
weather is set to get worse too, so it would be good to get at least
one trawl in before we get locked inside again......

Headed out....

After a very short time at Station E were are headed out of here,
chased away by the weather to try and do a more southerly site first
(and more protected), and come back here on the way back to Palmer
Station at the end of the cruise. The weather is blowing 30 knots
right now, snow is coming down and the seas are building, not a good
outlook for station E for the while. Before we left however we did
get in one trawl, and although not hoards of corals like before, I
did get a species that hasn't been found down here before, so that is
pretty exciting for me. I also get to go to bed early, which at the
moment is even more exciting! Maybe i'll catch a movie first, can't
decide, Stian is still busy fixing things us scientists have broken,
which at the moment is quite a few things.....:0)

Station E

Lat - 65'S 59.02
Long - 67'W 26.59
Water Depth - 563m

Well, I did tell you the lettering would be out of order! We got into
station E yesterday around 5pm and have been coring like crazy since.
I just got off watch and a trawl has just gone in the water, so i'll
stay up until the animals come up, grab my corals and anemones and
run off to bed....:0) Apparently we're up for some bad weather later
on tonight, so it's get as much in as possible in the short time we
have before. 30ft seas and snow are predicted.

Its that point in the cruise where everyone is starting to get more
comfortable around everyone, practical jokes are starting to be
played (we had some great "jelly sharks" put in the plankton trawl
today), silly cartoons pasted to the walls and people seem to be
joking around more. Tonight we have a "leap year party - Gothic
style", but it's all dependent on what science is going on, so watch
this space. It's supposed to be at midnight tonight, when in theory
we should be leaving this station and heading to the next one, but as
always on cruises we're losing time and trying to make it up
somewhere, especially with weather coming in. It's time for a party
though (still without alcohol I might add), they're usually pretty
fun, dancing, mingling, snacks and soda.........and best of
all........silly costumes made of trash bags and trawl nets......:0)

Who knew.....

Second day on-site at sample station B, i've just come off a really
busy shift - one box core and five mega-cores all in 12hrs.....more
mud than you can ever wish for.......if you like such things. We were
outside for pretty much the whole shift, hands in ice cold water
sieving mud and slicing, so my fingers have just about warmed up
after some lunch and a nice hot shower before bed. Stian is fast
asleep already, so i'm trying to type quietly....:0) Actually broke
out some hand-warmers today in my pockets, really glad I did, not
sure I would have survived without them.

One of the best things about todays shift though is that the sun came
out, the weather cleared (still a big swell) by 9am and who knew, we
can actually see land! When I say land, of course I mean ice and
snow, and maybe there is an island under there somewhere, but it was
an impressive site that the whole watch just sat in the sun for ten
minutes earlier to drink it in. Just to top off the end of the shift,
three humpback whales came and blew a bubble net right in front of us
(maybe 100m off), did the tail flip and side rolling too, was beautiful.

Nighty night!

To Emmy, Callie, Lala and Finn!

Hi girls (and boy.......sorry Finn you're the odd one out here...),
just a quick note to say I miss you all! Emmy and Callie - I loved
the picture of you and Riley, give that puppy fuzzy hugs for me next
time you see him, I miss him too. Thank you Lala for the lovely
message on my blog, tell Finn I can't wait to see his new hand-in-
mouth trick, and keep on being a fantastic big sister!

Yesterday we saw lots of humpback whales, sticking their tails out of
the water and rolling on their sides, you guys would have loved it!
The sun even came out a little later in the morning, and the weather
has calmed down a lot luckily, so we're back to sampling, lots of mud
everywhere!

Station B

Lat - 64'S 47.41
Long - 65'W 24.51
Water Depth - 672m

We've just arrived on site at Station B, after a welcome 15hrs off of
sampling. We did a quick call into Palmer Station to pick up some
chemicals for someone (and alas I missed getting on the internet to
post more pictures as I was sleeping..!), we didn't actually pull in,
a zodiac whizzed over and picked up the loot, and we arrived on
station around an hour ago. The seas have been bumpy, so although I
don't go on watch for another 7hrs, I was awake so thought I would
take in breakfast and check on my coral babies to see how they
survived the transit.

Station B was sampled by this group last time they were here (2000),
so less surveying to do and jumping straight into sampling. We'll see
what Station B yields (by the way, we did another trawl at AA and I
got another butt load of corals.....woo hoo!).

Coral-vana

Been a busy few days since we got on Station AA and tomorrow
afternoon we'll head out to Station B. The lettering of these
stations is a little non-intuitive, we'll miss out a few letters here
and there - thats because this group has been to this area before and
have other stations with letters already.

So - yesterday just after midnight our first bottom trawl came up
onboard, and was totally chock full of corals! More corals than I
have ever seen down here before, so I was kept very busy until well
after 2pm, when I got to climb into my bunk and sleep for a few
hours. The trawl was generally small but had a good diversity of
animals, I think most people were happy (though especially me, as it
was dominated by corals and anemones!). To be honest I lost count at
40 of one species, so gave up from there - but i've already used up
the entire set (minus two) of labeled tubes I made during our Drake
crossing (that were supposed to last pretty much the whole cruise),
and I now have 12 adults and 30 baby corals growing up in the fridge
- they're so cute! Hope they survive and start to build their
skeletons - it's nice to have these babies on the first day, gives
them the whole cruise to do what they need to do! I also managed to
get lots of nice anemone samples for my reproduction and population
genetics work, so thats great too.

Well, I should probably go and label more tubes, as we do have one
more trawl here to do before we head to the new site, and if it's
anything like the first, I need to start preparing now!

Station AA

Lat - 63'S 03.26
Long - 61'W 35.53
Water Depth - 597m

We're at Station AA, our first stop - just got on site and have a CTD
in the water (to collect water and various measurements from the
water column - temperature, salinity etc etc). Short blog as I need
water from this station, so should probably go help record the data -
I'll be taking 4-5 litres of water to keep my baby corals growing in
- it's important to minimise as many factors as possible when trying
to keep animals alive - so having water from 600m depth (where they
usually live) rather than surface water to grow them up in will keep
another factor at bay. My next task will be getting some "coral food"
from the plankton tows.....

Despite all the pretty pictures of land, glaciers and penguins, we're
now in the "norm" for oceanographic sampling - nothing in sight
except the ocean.........water water everywhere.........though we did
see humpback whales on the transit yesterday, doing the tail flip and
all, that was special.

My project

Leaving Palmer Station - 

Lat - 64'S 50.91

Long - 63'W 53.88

Water Depth - 362m

So what am I doing out here? Just realised I haven't really said that as yet, so here is a little spiel about what I will be doing on this trip. 

I'm a tag along on this cruise, so although I am not part of the main project, the scientists out here are sampling in areas I would like samples from, and my work coordinates nicely with their science goals. I look at cold-water corals - these are corals without the photosynthesising algae like you would find on the Great Barrier Reef - these corals tend to live in the cold deep-sea, generally at depths of 500m all the way down to 6000m and probably beyond, though there are some exceptions that live in shallower water, in areas where the it is cold (like the Antarctic). My research looks at why and how these corals are found where they are, and what happens to them when they are impacted - such as with climate change (ocean warming and acidification) or human impacted (commercial trawling). Specifically I look at reproduction and population genetics - so seeing how they reproduce (corals reproduce in a variety of ways) using histology, electron microscopy and larval culture and then also tracing corals genetically, to see how the populations are all connected together (or not as the case might be). This is my first of four Antarctic cruises in the next year, so the hope is to start experiments to see how different factors affect how corals reproduce and grow - but that is probably for the final cruise! 

One of the really cool things of working down here in the Antarctic, is the corals I'll be working with on this cruise brood their young - so they produce fully formed babies that crawl out of their mothers - i'll be taking these babies and growing them in aquaria to try and see how they behave and how they build their skeletons. I started this work on a cruise in 2006 - you can see a story about it - http://www.whoi.edu/oceanus/viewArticle.do?id=15366&archives=true - and it was really fun, so i'm hoping this will be too! 

Other than that, as I am invited on this cruise, I will be helping out with whatever else is needed onboard. When you stand a watch, you do everything and anything that comes your way. The things we'll be doing on this cruise are - Camera Tows, Sediment Traps, Time-Lapse Cameras, Box Coring, Mega Coring, Trawling, Epibenthic Sled, CTD, Plankton Towing, Nutrient Analysis - so alot to get done. We have five different sites down the Western Antarctic Peninsula (map on right) and we have three days at each site to collect all the data and samples we want to collect - it's going to be alot of work, but at this point everyone is really looking forward to getting working! 

About to head out...

We're about to head out from Palmer Station in about an hour and go towards our first sample site - woo hoo, lets get this show on the road! We should be there at around 5am, but we're going to do 4-5hrs of surveying (using sonars to see what the bottom is like - flat, bumpy, sandy, rocky) before we start sampling. We'll be working 12hr shifts here with things going on around the clock - i'm on the midnight to midday watch - Stian is on a slightly different schedule, he'll be doing 8pm to 8am, so at least we overlap a little in both our work and free time. I'm suspecting there will be samples I need from the other watch too (midday to midnight), in general although you're on a shift, you often end up working a little on the other shift too if there are samples you need.

So from here on in, no photos, as we loose the internet as soon as we leave Palmer. I'll try and be as descriptive as I can with what we're up to!

Palmer Station in the background, with me waiting patiently for us to pull in. Right after this photo I went to get another layer.....brrrrrrr.......

Palmer Station - with not much (or any in fact) snow. When I was here in May-June 2006 it was covered in snow, so it's pretty different without the white fluffy stuff. We'll stop here on the way back to Chile to pick up people too, so it'll be interesting to see if it gets more white just in the 3 weeks we'll be out.

Me on the deck of the bar sitting in an adirondack chair.....the sun was shining and clear views all around (see mountains in background). Palmer Station put on a delicious pizza party for us in the bar, followed by a few drinkies, pool and even some dancing.

Serious science. Our chief scientist from Hawaii on the right with his postdoc loading him up on the left......I should probably add that there is NO alcohol on the ship, it's a dry boat, so these port calls often turn into quite a party - both for us on the ship who have been dry and those on base who suddenly triple their numbers and have new people to talk to.

More serious science......

Palmer Station sits on a peninsula surrounded by a glacier - here is one edge with a cool cave. Unfortunately it started raining on me, so I didn't explore further. But I did get a really nice walk in before we had to head back to the boat.

The Gould pulled into the dock. Stian and the other techs have spent the two days loading and unloading containers and equipment, and setting up the deck ready for the science to begin. The run up to the science starting is really busy for the techs and pretty mellow for us scientists. That will reverse in just 12 hrs....

At Palmer Station....

Lat – 64’S 46.43
Long – 64’W 03.68

We’ve arrived at Palmer station – which means internet access and so I can post up some photos from the last few days! Think I’ve just about got the email blog posting all okay – will promise to write more when we get underway again.

Last few days have been pretty mundane, long transit this one and it’ll be good to get the science going in 2 days. Yesterday was a welcome change though – the day started at 6am when Polish scientists from Bellinghausen base came out to collect some boxes we’d carried over for them. All loaded smoothly onto their zodiac, though I was shocked at how much went in there!


Everything including the toilet (2 composting toilets in the card boxes) - the Polish picking up their gear...

Next we moved on to Copa field station – this is a US field station of just 6 people that is set up to monitor the penguin population and their associated predators (skuas etc). We had a bunch of supplies to drop off and as a welcome treat (and bonus for carrying gas tanks and boxes) we got to walk around the base and island for a couple of hours, look at the penguins and stretch legs, though the weather was a little damp, it was really nice to get out. More penguins than I’d seen last time, there were Gentoos and Chin straps, and lots of skuas flying overhead. Lots of babies too which were oh so cute!


Copa Field Station - never thought I would see a green lawn in the Antarctic but there we go.....

Feeling like kids on a field trip....Stian herding scientists off the Zodiacs to take our taste of the shore and penguins....

Gentoos (young and old) with the Gould in the background....


Feed me mamma......
Chin-strap penguins looking all dignified on the rocks.......they don't hang out with the likes of the Gentoos.......

Post-field-trip - Angelo demonstrating how we had to disinfect our boots after stepping on shore - to stop the spread of flora and fauna between islands..

Tonight we are at Palmer, then tomorrow we head out and are finally on our way to get the science started. Not sure what day of the week it is anymore, but we’ll be on station day after tomorrow at around 3pm…..

Cruise website...

The scientists from NCU are posting a website from the ship - here is the address

http://antarctica-ncsu.blogspot.com/

A post for Ellen B. at WHOI

Ellen you better be reading this.....:0)

Giellermot said to say hello - he lost your email address when he was moved to the Palmer, but is now back on the LMG - i'll give him your email address, but his regular LMG account will work.....

Peninsula tomorrow...

Lat - 60'S 41.71
Long - 60'W 38.61
Water Depth - 3647m

Tomorrow we'll be at the Western Antarctic Peninsula. We have some
supplies to drop off at Bellinghausen field camp and then at Copa
field camp and then we'll make our way down to Palmer Station, we
should get there day after tomorrow. The weather has been fantastic -
as flat calm as traversing the Pacific and the sun has been shining -
the Drake has luckily not held up to it's name - please please please
hold out for our next cruise in April!

All very mellow so far, just about have everything set up and ready
to go, have to sew some flags tonight to put on some instruments
we'll leave on the bottom for a year (the flags are on there so that
when we come back to get them we can see them on the sea surface),
maybe i'll start to make up my many noxious chemicals for the trip,
get that out of the way.....

Entering the Drake

Nice mellow day today - didn't get out of bed until 9.30am - woo hoo!
Meeting after meeting from there on though. First meeting of the day
was the fire and safety meeting - how to put your life jacket on,
where to meet if there is an emergency, who to go to if your toilet
overflows.....all those fun things. Second meeting was Stian's gig -
outside safety, when you can go outside etc., last meeting was then a
chemical safety meeting and lab use. The first day of a cruise is
always this way, and it doesn't matter how many times you go on
cruises, you still have to have these meetings everytime you sail.
Then a siesta, dinner and now i'm sat in the lounge writing emails
while some people are watching a terrible movie!

Tomorrow we'll have a couple of science meetings, set up equipment
and chemicals, and generally get organised. It's still 4 days from
Palmer Station though (our first port of call), so we're still 6 days
away from starting science - which really means time to get other
work done too (writing papers.....), so should probably get into that
rhythm sometime too............now it might be time for another
siesta......:0)

And we’re off…….

The truck has arrived early (or just a miscommunication as to when it would arrive……who knows…..), so tonight at midnight we are off. I’m rushing around so will keep this a short one – no matter how many “extra” days you get at port the last afternoon/evening is always a run-around……

Next post will be underway and hopefully in the Drake Passage…..

as per popular request, Stian working on the blocks this afternoon.....

Stian and my cabin, i've never stayed in a 'crew cabin' before, always a 'science cabin' - they are so much homier - carpet, TV, fridge, larger bathroom (one you can actually get changed in!) even a computer in there. Nice.


One of the labs today (see as compared to yesterday!).

Ug.....

And there is me trying to be helpful........while Stian was out lugging science gear around and generally working his ass off as he always does, what do I do but decide to do our collective washing........so now I owe him a new iPod nanno (I forgot to check pockets...)........what a day.......

Stian ever the optimist though, looked at me as I was in tears telling him what I did, and he just laughed, gave me a big hug and a kiss and said "yes! Now I get to get a new nanno with the video screen on it....". Thats my techno boy...:0) And he managed to salvage the earphones...

In Puntarenas

After three days of traveling finally arrived in Punta Arenas without any trouble (if somewhat tired and travel weary) on Monday, met up with a work weary Stian, good to see him again. The last few days have been spent loading and unloading, unpacking boxes and repacking in shelves and cupboards. Chasing chemicals and equipment yet to arrive, running around and a lot of standing around today waiting for other people to move their stuff so you can get to yours.

No one is in so much of a hurry anymore either, which seems to lead to more waiting around - we’re now delayed headed out until Friday evening at the earliest it sounds like – some of the crucial equipment has yet to arrive and is (hopefully) at the moment on a truck coming down from Santiago – a long drive that involves going into Argentina and back into Chile, as there is no road through the Patagonian fjords. Not that I am really complaining (except that I would really like this cruise to start!), as over half of my chemicals have also not arrived, so it gives an extra few days for them to get here – as those are not critical enough to hold the ship up for (well, not critical enough to the chief scientists – for me, they are pretty critical, one whole slab of my work would be cut out of this cruise without them)........so lets all pray to American Airlines to let them on the flight tonight......

Today we did move out of the hotels and onto the ship, so at least we don’t have far to go to go to work, so that makes a good extra hour of a lie-in in the morning!

Hope you all are well out there, I’ll try and make another post on here with photos before I head out.
The Lawrence M. Gould at the dock.


The Goulds butt....

A cruise ship the Marco Polo was pulled up opposite us today too, so we looked like a midget for the day.....



And this will eventually be where I will be set up in the lab.....or maybe.....they keep changing their minds as to where they really want me.......doesn't make it easy to unpack!

Dallas....

...and now in Dallas.......yet still less than 1/2 way to Punta Arenas, Chile......

On my way....

At Honolulu airport about to get on the plane........woo hoo!

Where are we going??

So here is a map of the Western Antarctic Peninsula - where I (and Stian) am headed on the 14th Feb - 17th March. I've posted this map small at the top of the blog as i'll be emailing posts from the ship with our coordinates on it so you can see where we are - but it's a little small, so here is the map larger too. Stian is already on his way to Chile, I'll be headed down tomorrow evening - takes 3 days from Hawaii to get to Punta Arenas - ouch!

Ah...

To post pictures via email, you have to compose the email in HTML -
which I will not be able to do from the boat...:0(

No photos...

Well folks, it doesn't look like photos are going to work by
emailing. Bummer as they are supposed to, and it would be cool to
post some Antarctic photos directly from the ship rather than having
to catch up later, but alas. I've tried minimising to beyond small
and they won't come through. I also have an email into the "help" so
maybe something will come up....

Testing Testing

Todays moan and groan will be posted by email (hopefully), to test
this out before i head to sea on saturday. The theory is I can keep
this blog updated while down in the Antarctic by sending posts by
email (as we don't have internet access). I'll put a picture on the
end of here too, just to see if that works.

Today (and it is only 10.30am) has been a typical "Hawaii" day. A few
days ago I went to the local post office just down the road from my
house, a parcel I sent to my older brother in the UK for Christmas
never got there, so I wanted to register it as missing and get the
insurance claim underway. This post office is just a small one, so I
couldn't do it there and they told me to go to the Ala Moana post
office. Although Ala Moana is less than 3 miles away, it still takes
30 minutes to get there, and in after work traffic, considerably
longer. So I decided to go there this morning first thing. I get
there and the guy behind the counter says "Oh no, we can't do that
here, you just have to call this number and register it as
missing".......now why couldn't they have told me that at my local!

I then went to the AT&T store to get my phone signed up to work while
i'm in Chile (for emergencies). The girl behind the counter asked me
where I was going, I said Chile, she then asked "so where in Africa
is that?". Nice.

Parking also drove me crazy, the multistory lot was again full (at
9.45am!!!), so it took me a good 40 minutes of driving around to find
a space. Needless to say i'm now at work and steaming. Need to go and
get a coffee, that might bring me down a little.....

So here is a picture (I hope) of me and Kate....I miss you Kate!

Recycle those crocs.....

http://www.solesunited.com/index.html

Shrove Tuesday

The remains of Liz (friend from when we did our PhDs together and now she is a Pdoc here!) and my "Pancake Day" feast. A UK tradition, somewhere along the line it came from religion (beginning of Lent - Shrove Tuesday), but I like to have an entirely non-religious pig out - Pancakes (crepes), lemon, sugar and a nice G&T.........ahhhhhhhh........

Now i'm lying in bed stuffed, updating this blog and swatting mosquitoes away......the wet weather has brought them out in force, we're on "flood watch" by the way........flood watch in Hawaii.......thought i'd moved on from that when I left the England...........

Dr Waller

Back at work today, back to the grind, back to not being paid properly, not being able to print anything, not having a phone.........just continues.....oh well.....

I went to the stockroom today to pick up some supplies before I head to sea this weekend, first time I had been there so had to set up an account. After the third time of me being asked who my professor was and me saying "me" they finally got it and let me order things. Sometimes looking young really irritates me, yes I know it shouldn't, but being carded the whole time and no-one believing you're really faculty until you shove it down their throats really starts to piss you off...... 

It did feel good after that point though having the three ladies follow me around saying "Dr Waller, do you need another box?", "Dr Waller, can I help you find something?","What else do you need Dr Waller?".........I usually hate the Dr Waller thing, but after that, it did feel good.......:0)

Silly Eggs

This post is for Lala. For lunch today I had "silly eggs and toast" (aka poached eggs) and it made me think of the egg loving Lala....:0)


Today has been mellow, full of little achievements though - I got my number plates for Beach Belle, groceries for this week, a step stool so I can reach the kitchen cupboards, unpacked, did my laundry, watched the Patriots loose the SuperBowl :0(, vacuumed, cleaned, sorted through three unsorted boxes, and updated my blog...:0) I also had to run the air conditioning today - not because it's too hot, but because it's so wet! It's apparently been raining heavily since I left (and still is now) and Grodnick is really damp. The air conditioning really helped to dry it up in here though, as well as washing and drying sheets and blankets. Makes me worry a little about leaving for a month next weekend though........am i going to come home to a house of mold.........

The Grand Canyon

Back from a camping trip to the Grand Canyon with Stian and Lily. Was alot of fun, and the canyon is totally spectacular (well, who didn't know that!). Last Monday we hiked down the Kiabab Trail to the Bright Angel Campground - right at the bottom, by the Colorado River and Phantom Ranch. Tuesday we did a day hike along the Clear Creek Trail - unfortunately not making it to the waterfall at the end.....if there is indeed a waterfall, which with how dry it all was is a little dubious. Weds we had a lazy day around the campground and Phantom Ranch - slept in, wrote postcards to be delivered by mule (you post them at the bottom and they are carried by mule to the top and posted), played Uno and Balderdash and generally relaxed. Thursday we headed all the way out (the original plan was to stay at Indian Campground ~1/3 of the way up, but the pull of hamburgers and a shower were too great) up the Bright Angel Trail.

Amazingly, though the day before was a snow/rain storm and we set out on Monday in drizzle, the weather was on our side, we had some spectacular views all time and never once got soaked. It was cold now (ice on top of the tent in the mornings), but really not too cold which was great. To be honest, I couldn't imagine hiking the canyon in mid summer 105F heat with tons of tourists around - I guess my theme of visiting National Parks in the winter is still holding true!

Friday we then had a "fat tourista" day and did the car sights around the South Rim (pulling up in the car, winding down the windows, taking photos, pointing at how beautiful it is, then driving off), stopping in the gift shops and generally having fun. We then headed back to Flagstaff, walked the Art Walk in the evening, and went to bed early for an early start (for Stian and I anyway) for the airport in the AM. Thanks to Lily for being our tour guide!

I'll let the pics tell the story.....

Any feature of this size, the pictures are never going to do justice to, but here it is - the Grand Canyon. Right at the bottom you can see the Colorado River, and thats where we headed.

Headed down the Kaibab Trail, an overcast day, but at least it didn't pour on us!

At the bottom - the Colorado River - and you can just make out on the left the roofs of buildings that are part of Phantom Ranch and the Bright Angel Campground. The Campground and ranch itself and further into a tributary on the left.

A mule team coming into Phantom Ranch......mules, not donkeys....:0)

My cutie all tucked up in the tent on our lazy day.

Lily and Stian standing on one of the bridges over the Colorado River.

On the way up....at the bottom of the Bright Angel Trail it was warm enough to wear a t-shirt to hike......

.......at the top there was snow!