Dolphins!

On our plankton-collecting trip the other day a large pod of dolphins joined us as we were travelling between sites. There must have been 50+ common dolphins swimming along with the boat jumping in the waves and playing. They stuck around the boat when we stopped to collect our samples in the sun, I think we may have accidentally encountered a feeding frenzy as loads of gannets had also gathered and were plummeting into the water around us (apologies for the picture quality - screenshotted from a video).

When we returned to the lab we discovered that we had managed to capture a very unfortunate jellyfish in the nansen bottle and then in one of our tiny tubes! 

Poor little guy!

He/she is a comb-jelly (or sea gooseberry) and is part of the group 'Ctenophore'. You can't see in my picture (which is actually quite poor) but they have rows of comb-like structures down their sides that show iridescent colours when they reflect direct sunlight!

The Plankton Team

A number of people have asked me exactly what ‘being part of the plankton team’ entails so I thought I would write a brief description of what we do here:

The plankton lab!!! (where the magic happens)

• We go out on the boat to a number of different sites in the waters around Sherkin Island where we collect samples of water from different depths using a nansen bottle, we analyse these samples on the boat for temperature, conductivity, and salinity using a probe
• We collect additional samples using a plankton net, which we drag through the water column to collect a sample of all the plankton through the range of depths covered by the bottled samples to get a quick idea of what species are in the area
• Environmental parameters such as tide time, weather, wind direction, swell, secchi disk depth (how clear the water is), are taken and noted down
• These samples are later analysed in the lab under the microscope for species composition and number of plankton present
• We enter this data into a database that contains data stretching back to 1978!

Tubing station

·      The data can be useful for many things: firstly just to see if anything has changed over the years, for instance perhaps due to climate change or anthropogenic introduction of nutrients. Another use for the data is that some species of plankton can be harmful to fish, crustaceans, and even humans. If a bloom of one of these species of plankton occurs then it may be better to not eat the shellfish produced in nearby areas, so the plankton monitoring can be a useful early warning system for these Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs). There are a number of oyster farms around the island so monitoring the plankton in the area is a good idea.

·      We have boat trips regularly and when we are not collecting our samples we are in the lab analysing them and trying to work through past samples that need to be processed. We also have to clean our sample tubes and make new tubes for plankton analysing which takes time as making the tubes involves sticking together pieces of plastic with Vaseline.

So that explains what I am doing here most of the time.

Sherkin Island

I arrived at Sherkin Island Marine Station in Ireland nearly 3 weeks ago now, after quite a long journey including 3 trains, 4 buses, and 2 ferries! I am currently a 'Bod' at the Marine Station as a member of the Plankton Research Team. On this team there are currently 3 people - myself, Clare & Maria. There are also 4 ‘Bods’ on the ‘Rocky Shore Research Team’ here also - Nonny, Lucy, Hannah & Ruth.

The island itself is stunning. Everyone is super friendly and there is a nice community feel and everyone seems to know each other (possibly not too difficult with the permanent population of the island totally around 100 people). Apart from the marine station some of the other key places on the island include:

• The hostel (this is in a great location and doesn’t charge extortionate prices and I’ve heard they do amazing breakfasts so I might have to go and stay for a night or two..)
• The school (this is very very small - I think it currently has less than 15 pupils!)
• The pub (the pub is great, there is pool and often live music in the form of some people casually playing instruments in the corner. However it is a tad pricey so our wages don't last an awfully long time. It is also on the opposite end of the island to the marine station and therefor takes 40 minutes walking to get there! The good news however is that the more people we know, the more likely we are to be able to get a lift from friendly passing vehicles)

-       There is no shop on the island – all food shopping is done by ordering things from the shop in Baltimore (on mainland Ireland) and they get delivered via the boat to Sherkin.

One of the many stunning views from nearby the Marine Station

There are loads of lovely little beaches around the island that look perfect for rockpooling and snorkelling. And there is lots of interesting wildlife - Whales can frequently be seen from shore, as well as dolphins, seals, and otters. I have a checklist of animals to see while I am here:     

•  Common dolphins
• Bottlenose dolphins
• Risso's dolphins
• Minke whales
• Fin whales
• Humpback whales
• Basking sharks
• Atlantic sunfish
• Common seals 

One of the Marine Station labs 

All the marine station Bods live on-site – there are residential blocks, 2 labs, a number of libraries, a small living room, and a kitchen/dining area. We have a cooking rota for evening meals, and we can request food each day to collect for the next day.

Not a bad view from the office!

Right next to the marine station is the ‘landing stage’ which is a little set of stairs down to the sea. There is a handy small cove which we can go swimming/snorkelling/paddling around in when the weather is nice (which it really is at the moment!). 

Have I mentioned that I can actually walk on water - one for the CV?

Hello

So I have decided that I should keep some sort of record of my life after graduation (so right now this a little premature as graduation is technically in September.. fingers crossed?!!). Hopefully this way I will be better at keeping people up to date with what i'm up to, and internet is often cheaper than using phones.

I hope I can keep this updated with interesting things. I'm going to try at least!

Also, I am now on LinkedIn (professional social network) so have a look if you fancy: