Today I woke up early to finish some last minute packing and get ready to leave Glover’s. We said bye to the staff and the cooks even gave us some cinnamon bread for later. Then we headed out on the boat to visit the Smithsonian research center and mangroves.

At the Smithsonian, we met Clyde, the station manager, and one of the researchers staying at the station as well. She was studying hybrid elkhorn and staghorn corals and how they can withstand high temperatures. Then, Clyde gave us a tour of the station and showed us some the things the experiments the researchers had set up.

Then, we went to the Mangroves and got to snorkel around the roots of the trees and see all the algae and sponges that were growing in that environment. We didn’t see any seahorses or manatees but it was still a fun last snorkel.

We boarded the boat and finally got back the Belize city, where we had a fun last lunch at Calypso restaurant. Then we had to say goodbye to Rose and Jahvier, and head to the airport. Leaving Belize was so hard, and saying goodbye to everyone at the airport was even harder, but I’m so glad that so many people will be in Houston over the summer.

Today I woke up later but had amazing french in the morning which was great. Then we had time to pack and clean and get ready for lionfish dissections. Me and Kristen got the second biggest fish and were able to look inside at its stomach contents, but we weren’t able to identify anything specific.

Afterward, I finally got a hammock and was able to get caught up on my journal, then Scott came down with lionfish ceviche that he made, and all the vegetarians tried it including me because lionfish are an invasive species and shouldn’t count.

Around 2:00 Elena, Jessica, Veronica and Same went out to snorkel one last time just for fun. It had been so hot so getting in the cool water was really nice, and we got to explore some patch reefs near the island. I once again saw a lot of corky sea fingers and sea fans, as well as some swollen-knob candelabrum, that I had to swim pretty close to identify.  We also saw some huge lobsters as well.

I quickly rinsed off once we got back to the island, and then we left for the Southwest Caye for a fun, secret TFB tradition. We took cute pictures, Rose taught us some dance moves, and we all signed a Rice shirt to hang up in the bar.

Today I woke up to the sound of a rainstorm. We had breakfast and then gathered in the classroom to do our last lectures and wait for the rain to die down. After lectures, the rain had let up enough so we could work on our marine debris project.

We went to the coral graveyard on the windward side for 15 minutes and all picked up and identified trash, and then did the same thing in the mangrove forest on the leeward side. It was upsetting to see how little of a dent we made and how the trash will just continue to accumulate. I definitely want to start to live with less waste back home.

A 2:00 we went out on the boat for our last snorkel in the atoll. We first went to a site called the Aquarium, and it really did look like we were snorkeling in an aquarium tank. There was so many beautiful fish and I was able to get some really good pictures since it was easy to dive down. I also saw a Southern Sting Ray swimming over the reef, which was really cool and it looked really pretty.

The second patch reef we went to was deeper, and it was really fun to dive down and swim close to the ocean floor. We also saw a large nurse shark on the sea floor, but there was a string with a can on it attached to the shark, and there was nothing we could do to take it off. Then, we went to a different reef and I saw a black tipped reef shark, which was also really amazing.

Today there was a lot of sea fans that were packed very close to each other, and some of them were bright purple while some had a very dull grey color with just a purple tint. Most of them were on the top of the rocks, but some small ones were on the seafloor. I also saw some really pretty sea plumes, whose colonies were large and had long branchlets.

Today we woke up to banana and pineapple pancakes, which were so good! Then we spent the next couple hours working on our poster, MP-Yay for Coral Reefs, where we analyzed our data from the hard coral coverage experiment and the sea urchin coverage experiment to see how the MPA affects marine health.

We presented our poster to Scott around 11:00 and then did one of the taxon lectured before lunch. After lunch, we did the last 2 lectures of the day, which was nice because we were all less tired and didn’t have to worry about them at night. Then we got ready to wade into the back reef, behind the island.

The second we started to wade through the marshy beginning, closest to the island, there was a resounding groan. The water was extremely hot and was burning everyone’s cuts and scrapes, as well as pretty gross to walk through. Once we got to the seagrass, it was a bit cooler and I saw a bunch of conch shells and some anemones. We swam further to the actual reef part and the amount of fish, anemones, and coral we saw made it totally worth it. There was an opening through the coral where there were schools of 30-40 fish eating the algae off coral.

We put a bunch of our finds into a bucket, and once back on shore the people who had taxons that we could collect separated them out. We even found things we weren’t expecting to, including a tiny octopus named Herman. It was so cute and kept changing colors when disturbed, so it finally made himself very compact and tucked all his tentacles under his body. After the mini taxon presentations, we released everything back into the ocean, including Herman and some Donkey Sea Dung cucumbers that I got to throw back to the sea.

In the back reef, I once again saw a large number of sea fans, but most of them weren’t as big as yesterday, as well as corky sea fingers, which were usually clustered together in a colony of 3 or 4. I also saw some black sea rods and porous sea rods that varied in color from greyish to purple tinted. Some of the porous sea rods I saw could have been slit pore, but I was having trouble distinguishing some of them.

After breakfast today, we left on the boat to explore the floor reefs past the island. The first site we stopped at was beautiful and there were so many large corals, however I started to get sea sick and by the time we got to the second site I felt like I was going to throw-up in my snorkel mask. I still got out to swim around and the reef was really pretty, I just felt like I couldn’t be completely present since I wasn’t feeling great. It was still cool that Scott was able to spear a lionfish and we might get to dissect and eat them later.

We came back to the island because people were feeling sick and had time to rest before lunch. After lunch, Scott gave us more time so everyone took a nap and when I woke up I didn’t feel sick anymore. We went back out on the boat to collect sea urchins to compare the percentage of sea urchins in the MPA and out of the MPA. We stayed in the atoll so the ride was a lot smoother and the 2 patch reefs we saw were a lot shallower. We got a ton of sea urchin and I got to hold some in my hand and see them move, also Claire found a sea egg which was one of the cutest marine organisms ever.

While in the reef I saw a bunch of the common sea fans that were mostly purple, and one was a really intense purple and huge. I saw less Corky Sea fingers today in the reefs today, there might have been some in the floor reefs, but since it was so deep and I wasn’t feeling well I could dive down. I also saw some pretty large sea plumes that were also a light purplish color.

After dinner and lecture, we finished our day with a crab race. We all picked our crabs, which were supposed to be hermit crabs, but Elena and Sam somehow got large blue crabs, but they didn’t win anyway. My crab ended up not moving and then turned and went the opposite direction if the finish line:(

Today I got to sleep in because breakfast didn’t start till 7! After breakfast, Scott had us practice using our research equipment on land before we got in the water. We looked at the proportion of dead leaves on the main trail of the island. Once we were confident with using the transect tape and quadrats, we got ready for using it in the reef.

Putting on the dive suit over an already sweating body was a struggle, but once I had all my gear on I headed to the dock. Once in the water, we used the same technique with the quadrats and transect tape in the sea grass to find what percentage of the benthos contained worm mounds. On the way out of the water, I realized I lost my clipboard and had everyone looking for it, but Elena ended up finding it right in front of the ladder in the sand (sorry everyone:/).

After a delicious lunch, we headed to what Scott told us was Adrienne’s favorite spot, the Coral Graveyard. It was really interesting to be able to identify the different hard corals and also me and Jessica found beautiful pink conch shells and pretended we were in Moana.

Then we headed back into the water, to repeat the same experiment but with measuring the proportion of hard corals. We went to one patch reef in the Marine Protective Area which was pretty hard to maneuver in since it was really close to the surface. The second reef we visited was outside the MPA and was a lot deeper than the first so it was easier to swim and use the equipment. I really felt like a real marine TFB being able to use the quadrat and tape, and swim so close to the coral.

While at the different patch reefs I saw a bunch of the corky sea fingers and purple sea fans. I also got to see some bipinnate sea plumes as well as some sea rods, however it was hard to tell which type of sea rods they were, but I definitely spotted black sea rod.

Today, I woke up and packed up my things in preparation for going to Glover’s. We left the Tropical Research Center and began the drive to the marina. The drive was only an hour to Belize City and once we got there we pulled up to a casino, that had the marina and dock behind it. We all boarded the boat and had a three-hour boat ride to the research station.

On the boat ride, we met Javier and Rose, who are going to be our marine safety officers. I also was able to see the beautiful ocean water changing colors as we got further from the mainland and closer to the island.

We finally arrived at Glover’s and got settled and a toured the island. Then got ready for our first time snorkeling in the water. We swam over the sea grass near the dock and saw a yellow-spotted stingray and upside-down jellyfish. After practicing we headed back to the dock on saw a really tiny baby nurse shark, which was adorable.

On the reef patch, I saw a bunch of corky sea fingers on the edge of the patch, as well as common sea fans, which all varied in sizes and shades of purple throughout the patch. I’m so excited to spend the next week here!