Day 7 - Mud in the morning

Yep, today was "mud day".  And it started early...breakfast was at 6:30am?  Have you been wondering what the crew looks like that early?

Breakfast is served - 6:30am: The looks on Ty (far right) and Daniel's (next to Ty) faces are particularly telling.

So, with carbon consumed the crew headed over to the lab to boot-up, collect equipment and head for low tide.  Today we could walk where we were going...just about 5 mins from the lab, at the upper end of the South Slough.

I got to the lab before just about everyone else and discovered that a crime was being committed - a jail break!  One of the animals we collected yesterday was making a break for it!  It was a gumboot chiton (Cryptochiton stelleri)...hilarious.

This is where I found this chiton...making a break for the sea.

Once there I realized that the mud flat was just too broad for each team of four students to do their own mudflat vertical profile and survey of biodiversity, so we shifted gears and did one LONG transect, between 240-270 meters in length.  We started at the water's edge and a -0.7' tide and the teams laid out three 30m tapes end to end and got to work.

Here's the crew trudging across the mud flat...eager to get to work.

Here's the bottom end of the transect.  The line started at the waterline of the channel into Coos Bay.

L-R: Blake, Dallas, Tony, Bailey

Every 5 meters along the line students measured changes in vertical distance and then did some digging to look for representative animals in the mud - yum!  Look how black it is...lots of hydrogen sulfide (rotten egg gas) in there.

L-R: Blake, Tony, Bailey, Dallas

Here's another team working on their length of the transect.

L-R: Elysa (white boots), Lindsey, Kristin, Jessica (who can't keep her hands out of the mud)

Slowly but surely the work moved along.  It took over two hours to complete the project.

L-R: Lindsey, Kristin, Jessica, Elysa

You have to be careful not to break the shovel handles.

L-R: Daniel, Ty, Patrick.  Where's Mackenzie?  She was there.

Every turn of the shovel revealed clams, worms, and lots and lots of black mud - rich in H2S (hydogen sulfide = rotten egg gas).  Ah, the work, the smell, the joy!

They measured vertical elevation change every five meters, and dug into the muck to see what animals they could find every five meters as well.  It was a fantastic outing.  Once the team closest to the water was done they'd haul their 30m tape and gear to the head of the transect, lay it out, and get to work again.  About 2.5 hours later they were done.  That work was followed by about half an hour of rolling rocks in the upper intertidal zone while collecting small Hemigraspsis crabs.

They were tired, but mostly all smiles by the time we headed back to the lab to rinse gear.  Did I say I'm glad that we walked today...so the mud stayed in the great outdoors and not in the vehicles?

The class spent the rest of the morning working up data and developing a graph of the vertical profile of the mud flat with indications of the dominant species at each survey spot.

After lunch we gathered for a couple of hours of class where we discussed mud and estuary communities.  Here are a few shots to let you see what our teaching classroom is like.

LR: (front) Dallas, Ty, Tony, Mackenzie, Elysa, Lindsey (back) Daniel, Patrick, Jessica, Bailey, Blake, Kristin.  There are tanks along the side of the classroom where seawater is pumped into the lab so we can keep animals alive. Sweet!

It's hard to believe that we've been here nearly a week already, and at the same time, it's hard to believe that it's been only a week.

The class is gelling well, working hard, and having lots and lots of fun.  In fact, as soon as I signal a break during class so people can take a bathroom break, etc., they flock to the holding tanks along one side of our classroom to look at stuff there...it looks almost like a feeding trough!  Hilarious!  They are a great bunch.

This afternoon we attended the weekly OIMB seminar.  Then that night the crew gathered to watch a Shark Week special (their request) about some guy who can put sharks in a catatonic state.  If you ask me, he's completely nuts and will someday end up like Grizzly Man - eaten by the animals he loves.  Sigh.  We'll see.

Cheers.