Transects 7/1/15

Today was transect day! I would say it's probably my least favorite part of science but the skills that you learn in it is integral to doing a lot of underwater study. We spent most of the day working on developing these skills. Everyone was at different levels and experience with transects so we used two methods. We broke into groups and had two separate snorkels, one before lunch and one after lunch so that we had time to recuperate.

The very first method was just called regular transect. In this particular method you take a tape measure and divide your selected plot of land into 1 meter increments. From this you follow along each section and take pictures, count, and record the various species that you observe. I was in a group with Adam, Grace, Sonja, Codee, and Sophia. The measuring sounds like it would be easy but stupidly my group chose to go further down along the long shore current which resulted in being pulled down the beach in a matter of minutes. To recover your spot where you were observing you had to swim against the current which for many caused exhaustion to set in quicker. For each transect we observed we took careful detailed pictures and used our dive slates to help us remember any details that we might forget. For almost the first half an out that we were out on the water we struggled to make sure that everyone was on the same page conceptually between pushes from the waves and water in the snorkels. The second half our we finally got all of our flags down, but it took longer than we had expected because some people could hold their breath longer than others which limited the tasks that they could do or it just extended the time that it took to complete it. By the time the hour was up we had only taken pictures of three out of the seven transects that we had established and needed to come and and take a rest and dry off before lunch. As we were all coming in Adam and I talked and realized that a lot of our transect had not been well thought out and if we strategically moved some of the flags from the mostly turtle grass covered bottom to the other side we could include more of the patch of coral and get a wider variety of species. We made the decision and decided to turn around and quickly move the rest of the flags for our group so that when we went out again we would be able to finish up the regular transect method efficiently.

Sure enough we popped right out after a tasty lunch of stir fried veggies over rice and got the rest of the regular transect knocked right out.

The second method was called the point quarter method which we were supposed to start in the second half of our snorkeling time was much more straight forward because we just extended the line that we had already established so that we would have the 10 sections that Dr. Gilchrist wanted. The difference between this one was we had the flags spaced out 2 meters apart. Basically for this one we had one person float at the middle holding the tape measure that was stretched out to 2 meters, while two other people sat at the ends of tape measure. Then, the fourth person would rotate around the the 4 quadrants that we had established in a counter clockwise motion taking pictures and observing species. I am inserting a picture that explains this method hopefully better than I do.

After we came in the whole group took a long, well-deserved rest until dinner. There's a lot of hanging out and such but you don't realize how tired you are until you start wanting to go to bed at 10 pm! Dinner was a tasty affair with fresh shrimp on a bed of lettuce. The issue was that everything was drowning in what I would say was an excessive amount of paprika but when you are on this island food is a really super awesome thing to look forward to. While here, I am going to be observing pescaterianism. My thought is that if I can kill in, I'll eat it and while most of the time I don't eat seafood  in the states, I am on a beautiful island where everything is only a few hours old. How can you pass something up like that?

Following dinner we regrouped and started going through all of the pictures and blogging (I am a trend setter! :] ). It was a little difficult to try and sort out the photos but because we had taken pictures of the sky in between the transects the sorting wasn't too bad. I am going to give a shout out to Casey O'Connor and FIRST robotics for helping me with my basic Excel skills to calculated percentages and coverage of coral. I will say that with part of our transect featuring a majority of turtle grass we got off easier than the other group, but we didn't have large a variety of species. All of our assignments and presentations will be going into an ePortfolio at the end of the course.

Finishing your work and slamming your computer lid shut is a really satisfying feeling, I must say. Everyone spent the rest of the night sitting around talking and joking and telling stories. Brian (one of the interns) about his teaching experience and love for Kindergartners, Tyler (another divemaster intern) with her couch surfing stories, and Dante with his singing of "Dust in the Wind". I love being around here and the relaxed atmosphere that everyone has. Tyler, Austin, Adam, and I stayed up later after everyone went to bed swapping more stories, talking about the benefits of barefootness, and New College stories. Tomorrow we are going on a hike to visit the locals!

Buenas noches!