MBFE - Friday 5/10 - Docks, piers and pilings, a trip to the SSNERR, and the OIMB Friday afternoon seminar

We hit the ground running Friday morning.  We started with a lecture/discussion on the pier, dock, and piling communities.  This an extremely interesting community because floating docks often have a mixture of intertidal and subtidal species attached to them.

Following lecture, we had enough time before lunch to go down to the docks and take a look at life there.

So, how does one study a floating dock community, without getting soaked?  Like this...

Let Anne demonstrate.

And here are (L-R) Matt, Eric and Collin taking a close look.

Caleb and Sam won't be outdone.

...nor Caleb!

Here are Emma and Victoria taking a good, long look...

...and Ben too!

Here are are (L-R) Michelle, Jenn, Maddy and Liv hard at work.

And here are just a few examples of what they could see...giant subtidal barnacles...

...sea anemones...

...sponges, mussels other sessile organisms...

...a chiton, mussel, barnacle, and more...

...plus tube worms and more anemones.

Not to worry, our work day wasn't done before lunch.  After lunch we all headed to SSNERR - South Slough National Estuary Research Reserve.  This is one of only five such wetland and estuary research reserves on the west coast of the United States.  So it's awesome that we have such easy access to it!

Here's the crew walking through the lush Oregon coastal forest - it feels downright primeval, like you'd expect to see dinosaurs crashing through the underbrush at any time.

And here's part of the crew looking out over the South Slough mud flat and tidal marsh.  

Here's the crew posing up on a bridge over one of the tidal creek channels. (L-R) Kathrine (Holyoak). Hunter, Sam, Eric, Ben, Anne, Liv, Chey, Collin, Matt, Caleb, Victoria, Maddy, Emma, Jenn and Michelle (top, back).

Somewhere along the way someone picked up a small garter snake, and it took a liking to Caleb, wrapping itself tightly around his thumb.

Here's another shot of the crew making their way along a path at the reserve.  What a beautiful place!

We wrapped up the week by attending the OIMB Friday seminar.  This week the presenter was Heidi Fuchs, Rutgers University, whose talk was titled "Waves and turbulence as navigational signals for dispersing larvae.”  It was an interesting talk about two closely related species of larval snails, one that lived inshore and one that lives offshore, and the different ways they respond to waves and turbulence.