Tag Archives: Michiel Noe

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Our Fastest Hike!

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Hey guys! It’s Michiel again : )

The class was up early to collect the pitfall traps we set yesterday. We felt like real TFBs as we were out there because we went out there without a professor to lead us. We were able to pick up all the traps in about 30 minutes. We went back to the station with our tubes, poured out the contents in a petri dish, and picked out arthropods with forceps. We ended up collected five arthropods from the canopy traps filled with water, seven arthropods from the canopy traps fill with pee, twenty arthropods from the floor traps filled with water, and twenty-six arthropods from the floor traps filled with pee. We were able to conclude that there are more total bugs on the forest floor than the canopy, and we believe this is true because the forest floor is more nutrient rich than the canopy due to falling organic matter. We also saw that, in general, the arthropods preferred the pitfall trap with nutrients; however, the data shows that the arthropods in the forest floor may prefer it more than the ones in the canopy. We believe that maybe arthropods in the canopy have adapted to less available nutrients and thus don’t seek them out much, unlike the ones on the forest floor, but we’re not too sure about that reasoning.

After analyzing our data, Adrienne, Ava, Sophia, Elena, Rusty, Michael, McKenna, and I went out to collect the camera traps we had set up the other day. We went through the trails really fast, sweating through our clothing at some points. Eventually, the rain started, which cooled us down, but we were able to get through the trails that took us the entire day on Friday in only an hour and a half. After collecting the traps, we went back to Las Cuevas where we noticed the incessant sound of Mexican Burrowing Toads coming from Frog Pond. A couple of went out to go look at them, but, unfortunately, they all seemed to be hidden in the thicket that surrounded the pond. However, it was really cool to hear the croaks coming from all directions. Here’s a picture of us there!

The rest of the day was fairly uneventful. However, we did get to see a dog on the road! I finally saw a mammal, you guys. My phone was dying, though, so I couldn’t take a picture. I’m sure you all know what a dog looks like. It was brown and white and the breed of dog was indiscernible.

Hopefully, I’ll get to see some wild mammals soon!

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Our Luckiest Day!

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Hey guys. It’s Michiel again : )

Today was really eventful. It started off slow with breakfast and a lecture in the morning, but it quickly picked up. At the end of the lecture, Scott had a discussion with us on nutrient availability in the canopy and the forest floor, and he related it to arthropods. Together, we came up with the question “How does nutrient availability influence arthropod abundance in the canopy and forest floor?” After we came up with this question, Scott told us that the way we’d be using nutrients for our experiment would be by peeing in tubes and using those tubes as traps. This was really surprising to all of us, and we promptly drank as much of our water bottles as we could. After we filled our tubes, we went out to the Mayan Trail to set up these pitfall traps. Basically, we each put one tube of pee flush against the trunk of a tree and another tube of water on the opposite side of the trunk. We also put a tube of pee and a tube of water in the soil at the base of the tree. Arthropods are expected to fall into these tubes.

While we were going through the path to set up these traps, we passed by a tree with scratch marks and an indentation in the ground at the base. We believe it may have been one of the cat species using the tree to sharpen/shorten its claws, but the scratch marks seemed to high and the indentation too big for it to be a margay (Leopardus wiedii) or an ocelot (Leopardus pardalis). However, they were too low and it was too small for it to be a jaguar (Panthera onca) or a puma (Puma concolor). My best guess is that it may have been a juvenile jaguar or puma.

Tree with scrapes
Indentation in ground

After a couple of hours, we finished setting up our traps and went back to Las Cuevas for lunch, After lunch, Scott and Adrienne sent us out to look for some leaf cutter ant nests in the clearing that surrounds the station. Elena and I didn’t find any, but we did hear something in the brush that kind of sounded like a monkey. We know that it wasn’t a black howler monkey (Aloutta pigra) because it sounded nothing like a black howler monkey, so we think it may have been a spider monkey (Ateles geoffroyi), but we couldn’t see through the brush, so we have no idea. After we heard it, though, someone called out that they had found a leaf cutter ant nest, so we went over there to check it out. Scott told us that it couldn’t be more than a year old, which is exactly what we were looking for. We began to dig right next to it so we could see the fungus garden. After a while of digging, major ants came out to defend their home. Ava and Elena kept trying to pick it up, and eventually they did! I’m proud of them. After a while of digging, we saw the fungus garden, which is gray, and then Scott pulled out the queen, which we each held. After achieving our goal, we went to a new nest that was older. However, after a while of digging, we couldn’t find anything ­– there weren’t even any ants. Before we gave up, though, we saw a Mexican Burrow Toad! We thought that it would be impossible for us to find this frog, but we all really wanted to because it’s so ugly (but in a cute way). I’m really glad we found it. Anyway, we went to a new leaf cutter nest after we put the toad back. This nest was much larger than the last, and it had soldier ants, which are much larger and bite harder than the major ants. After a while, we were able to get to the fungus garden and Elena and Ava picked up the soldier ants!

Mexican Burrowing Toad

After the leaf cutter ant nests, we had lectures, then we had dinner. After dinner, we went on a night hike! The night hike was crazy. We saw two Morlet’s Tree Frogs, which are endangered, and we say nine snakes. It was really cool seeing all the snakes because we would think that we had found them all and then someone would find a new one. We were fixated on one of the snakes for 20 minutes, which we saw eat some red eyed tree frog eggs, which are also endangered. After we watched the snake eat those eggs, we went back to Las Cuevas, worked on our blogs and field notebooks, and went to sleep.

I’m really hoping I see more mammal-related stuff tomorrow, but I know for sure that I’ll keep you guys updated!

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First Day of Hiking!

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Hey y’all! It’s Michiel again : )

I woke up today at 5:45 for my first full day at Las Cuevas. I was planning to wake up at 6:30, but the birds were so loud that I couldn’t stay asleep. Also, last night there was a black howler monkey (Aloutta pigra) right next to the station that was yelling at another black howler monkey elsewhere in the forest. It definitely kept me awake longer than I wanted to be. Anyway, I joined my fellow TFBs on the patio around 6 and we birdwatched together. I saw three beautiful turkeys, and a couple vultures. Later, we had breakfast, then we were tasked to come up with a research question that involved using camera traps. We came up with “Where are different functional groups (large/small predators and large/small prey) most abundant (forest, trail road)?” To answer this question, we decided to set up camera traps throughout forested areas, on trails, and on roads.

We left the station around 10 to begin setting our traps. For the first two hours, we were all so amazed by the surrounding fauna and flora that we only managed to set six traps – one on a trail and five on a road. While we were in the forest, we actually saw Scarlet Macaws! I’ve included a picture of them here.

After setting these traps, we made our way back to the research station for lunch at 12:15. Lunch was kept pretty short because we needed to go back out there and set more traps. When we went back out there around 1, we traversed through a trail with much more hills (it was actually almost completely uphill then completely downhill) than we had experienced on the other trail. We stayed on this trail until about 6:15 and managed to set 4 traps on the trail, 5 traps within the forest, and 1 trap near Frog Pond. While we were hiking this trail, we saw some beautiful bugs that Caio kept picking up, a cave with ancient Mayan pottery in it, and a lot of leaf cutter ants. We also came across a termite nest, and Scott told us to take termites from it and eat them, which, of course, we did. They tasted really fresh – like carrots. We also went up the bird tower, which had some amazing views.

Unfortunately, I did not get to see any mammals. However, we did hear a black howler monkey yelling while we were placing road traps in the morning. I’m expecting that any sightings of mammals will be really rare throughout the next couple of days, but hopefully the camera traps will take a lot of good pictures of them.

The rest of our day went pretty smoothly. We had dinner, had a break to recuperate from the exhaustion we were experiencing, then had some lectures. I’m hopeful that tomorrow I’ll get to see some mammals!

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Journey to Caracol and Las Cuevas!

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Hey guys! Once again, it’s Michiel : )

We woke up this morning at the TEC (one of the most beautiful places ever) and quickly got ready for breakfast at 6:30. After breakfast, everyone gathered their luggage near the side of the road and got into vans for our journey to Caracol. On our way to Caracol, I got to sit in the front seat, where I prepared for my topic lecture that would be happening later that evening (spoiler alert). I read a bunch of papers with tiny letters while we were traveling on very bumpy roads. I may have gotten a little carsick, but it was only a little headache, and I was committed enough to presenting a wonderful lecture that a headache wouldn’t stop me. I managed to read everything I needed to by the time we got to Caracol. There, we saw a HUGE Ceiba tree, Mayan middle-class homes, and a beautiful pyramidal temple. We climbed to the top of that temple, looking in ancient bedrooms and tombs on the way up. Once we finally got to the top, we got a truly amazing view of the Chiquibul Forest. While we were there, we also saw white lined sac bat. After the pyramidal temple, we saw their place of astronomical observation, an area where they played a ballgame, and an aquifer. After all this, we had lunch, during which we were able to hear Black Howler Monkeys (Alouatta pigra) screaming throughout the forest. I, unfortunately, wasn’t able to get any pictures of these monkeys, but here is a picture of us on top of the temple and me next to a Ceiba tree!

After lunch, we left Caracol and continued our journey to Las Cuevas Research Station. On our trip, we saw three turtles crossing the road, two scarlet macaws, and a toucan! Once we finally reached the station (around 4:30), we were shown around. The station is really nice; I think I’m going to really enjoy it here. After our orientation, we began catching up on lectures that we had fallen behind on. After two taxon lectures, we had dinner, then I presented! I presented on life in the rainforest canopy, and I think I did really well, but we’ll see. After I presented, there were a couple more lectures, then we worked on our blogs and field notebooks and went to bed.

I’m really excited for everything to come. I’ll be sure to keep y’all updated!

2022

The Belize Zoo!

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Hey guys! Once again, it’s Michiel : )

Today started out with us leaving Glover’s Reef! I’m sorry to leave it, but I’ve been really excited for this new part of our class. We had breakfast at 7, then everyone kept getting ready for the journey until about 9 (during that time I finished the book I was reading  – Ghost Story by Peter Straub). At 9, we boarded the boat and began to depart from the reef. Faith and I had a really fun time while that was happening, because we got emails regarding our CHEM TA applications at that time, which we had to respond to, but the wifi from the island was getting further and further away. We were both able to respond before we lost connection, though : ).

The boat ride lasted about 4 hours. The majority of us fell asleep for most of the trip, but there were a couple of times that everyone was up to look for some dolphins (I didn’t get to see any). Also, a lot of people said that they had seen flying fish as we were leaving. Anyway, we got back to Belize City around 1, and we had lunch at Calypso, which is a restaurant right on the dock that we docked at. Then, we went to a grocery store, where I bough lots of items that I started running low on while we were on the island, and Ava and I both got a Klondike Bar, which was a wonderful treat for the both of us.

Later, we got to the Tropical Education Center, which is beautiful. The trails here are wonderful to walk on, and the cabanas are delightful to stay in. I’m really sad that we’re only staying here for one night. We were also given a presentation by Dr. Boris Arevalo on Scarlet Macaws. The data he presented was really interesting, but he masterfully weaved in advice throughout the presentation about doing research and continuing in our careers, which really motivated a lot of us to do incredible work in our futures. After the presentation, we had dinner, then we went to the Belize Zoo for a night tour! It was amazing. I saw a lot of my taxanomic group (mammals), including jaguars (Panthera onca), a puma (Puma concolor), an ocelot (Leopardus pardalis), a margay (Leopardus wiedii), white-lipped peccaries (Dycotiles pecari), a tapir (Tapirus bairdii), a paca (Agouti paca), and a northern tamandua (Tamandua mexicana). The jaguars would roll over and climb trees so that the zookeeper would feed them pieces of chicken (and one of them was named Lindo), and the ocelot made a really funny noise as it ate the chicken that literally sounded like “nom nom nom.” Also, we got to feed the tapir some carrots and feed it! It was adorable.

I’m really glad we saw all these species today, and I hope we get to see more at Las Cuevas. Here are some pictures I took during the tour!

Baird’s Tapir (Tapirus bairdii) Thank you Ava for taking this picture!
Puma (Puma concolor)
Jaguar (Panthera onca)
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Last Day on the Reef!

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Hey y’all! It’s Michiel again : )

I’m sure you guys already know that the day started with everyone waking up and getting breakfast by 7. After waking up this morning and getting breakfast, everyone quickly put on their snorkel gear, got their transects, quadrats, and clipboards, and boarded the boat to go out to a non-MPA reef. There, we collected data for the research question I talked about on June 11. The reef was a pretty good depth, not to shallow or too deep, but it had a lot of fire sponge and fire coral. Thankfully, I managed not to touch any while I was there. It also had a lot of dead coral and there were very few fish. I remember seeing two Cocoa Damselfish (Stegastes variabilis), but I can’t remember seeing any other fish I could identify. After, Ava and I laid out our transect and counted alive and dead coral in our quadrat, the entire class began collecting sea urchins for 10 minutes. This place was full of sea urchins; I ended up getting 11, but some people were able to find a lot more. We ended up with 177 sea urchins after only 10 minutes.

After this reef, we went to a much nicer, deeper reef where the class had a chance to snorkel without the pressure of collecting any data. This was our last time to snorkel on the trip, and I’m really happy with the reef they ended up taking us too. The coral in the area was beautiful, and I saw so many fish. In terms of herbivorous fish, I saw a bunch of Cocoa Damselfish (S. variabilis), some really large Sergeant Majors (Abudefduf saxatilis) – they were about 20 cm – Threespot Damselfish (S. planifrons), and Bicolor Damselfish (S. partitus). I also saw a Blue Tang (Acanthurus coeruleus) and a male Bluelip Parrotfish (Cryptotomus roseus), both of which I followed for a while to get a good picture. I got some fine-ish pictures of the Blue Tang, but I couldn’t get any good ones of the parrotfish because the parrotfish kept going all over the reef, moving through coral so fast that I could barely keep up with it. All of these fish were really hard to get pictures of because they tend to hide within the coral whenever you approach them.

Huge Abudefduf saxatilis

After we left that reef, we compiled all of the data we’ve collected over the past couple of days. We were able to conclude that there is a correlation between a high percentage of live coral coverage and less sea urchins. However, we didn’t see any correlation between the amount of urchins and whether we were collected at an MPA or a non-MPA. We think this may be due to our ability in collecting sea urchins improving as we went from reef to reef. This would explain why we collected so few sea urchins from the first non-MPA site we went to, which probably skewed our results. After determining all of this, we put all of our information on a poster and presented our project to Scott and Adrienne.

Later in the day (after lectures and dinner) we dissected lionfish. My group was given a really tiny lionfish, which was challenging, but my confidence in my dexterity skills skyrocketed after I saw how well I did on the dissection. The most interesting part of the dissection was opening its stomach to examine its content. We were able to see some invertebrate organism within it that measured about 2.1 cm. After dissecting the fish, Scott took them, fileted them, and made ceviche. The ceviche was delicious, and we were all happy that we were simultaneously having a wonderful snack and contributing to the betterment of our marine environment.

After the ceviche, we worked on our assignments and got ready for bed. This was the last day of the reef! I’m sad it’s over – I had so much fun snorkeling – but I’m excited for everything I’m going to learn in the rainforest.

The best photo of the blue tang I could take : (
A photo Sophia took of the blue tang!
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Trash Day!

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Hey y’all! It’s Michiel again : )

I woke up this morning after nearly freezing to death last night. It wasn’t actually cold (I mean, how cold could it get in the tropics?), but my bed is right by the window and the wind kept blowing into my sheet, and I couldn’t figure out how to close the window, so that was fun. It wasn’t that bad, though, I’m definitely being dramatic. After waking up, I met everyone for breakfast, and they make the most amazing pancakes here; I was so happy when I saw them waiting for us.

After breakfast, we went to the forereef. The waves were pretty strong today, so I started getting a headache on the boat and it kept getting worse as I was in the water, but it was definitely worth it because the area of the reef we saw was so amazing. We saw spur and groove formation, a swarm of ctenophores,  and a sea turtle lying in the sand! This area was also way deeper than any area we had been to before (about 70 feet) and there was a reef drop right next to it which dropped for hundreds of feet, so we really got to test our breath-holding abilities. One of the experienced divers actually went down about 100 feet! While we were there, we saw a school of fish, but I could not get close enough to figure out what they were. They were mostly blue and larger than a damselfish or a surgeonfish, so they may have been a parrotfish, but they may have also been something entirely different. Parrotfish and other types of herbivorous fish are known to travel in schools, so it isn’t unruly to guess that these may have been parrotfish, but, again, they were so deep that I couldn’t get a very good look. It may not have been an herbivorous fish at all. If it wasn’t, then I didn’t get to see any herbivorous fish today because we were too far from the reef to see that many.

Unknown fish (possibly herbivorous)

After leaving the forereef, we had a little break, then watched some lectures and had lunch. After lunch, we started coming up with a research question that would involve a beach clean-up. We ended up with “What percent, by mass, of the trash on Middle Caye needs to be disposed of off island? What area is the most efficient for collecting trash?” We hypothesized that over 50% of the trash would need to be moved off island for disposal and that the coral graveyard would be the most efficient area for trash pick-up. To collect data, Ava, Michael, Maggy, Adrian, and I went out to the bunks to collect trash for a total time (between all people) of one hour. Different groups did this at different locations around the island. Back at the wet lab, we weighed everyone’s trash bags, separated burnable trash from non-burnable trash, and weighed the non-burnable trash. With our data, we discovered that only 11.43% of the trash here needs to be removed from the island because they actually burn the plastic here, so they only remove the metal and glass. We also found out that the most efficient area for trash pick-up was the area behind the kitchen because the people there collected 16.41 kg of trash per person-hour. We believe that the reason the most efficient area wasn’t the coral graveyard was because the coral graveyard’s trash was more spread-out and it was much smaller, so it didn’t contribute as much in terms of mass. Hopefully this data can be helpful to the Belize Fisheries Department because they have plans to do more beach clean-ups on Middle Caye!

After presenting our project to our professors, we had another lecture then dinner. Right before dinner, though, Nate set a shell down in front of a hermit crab, and we saw it change from it’s previous shell to that one! It was so gross. Anyway, we stayed in the dining room until it closed because we were all talking, and then Ruth (a marine safety officer) joined us and told us about the clothes she makes and the history of Belize. She taught us a lot, and she’s been a super important part of our stay here on the reef, so we couldn’t be more thankful to have her.

After dinner, we were going to go on a night snorkel, but the weather picked up and we decided that it wouldn’t be safe to go. The group just ended up working on our blogs and field notebooks before going to bed.

Overall, today was a great day! Here’s a group picture of us washing our hands after we finished handling all the trash, a picture of Sophia, Elena, and I as we were working on our poster for our trash presentation, and a picture of an iguana.

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Fire and Burns

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Hey guys! It’s Michiel again : )

We started this morning with breakfast (big surprise) before going out to collect more data for the research question we started on yesterday. The first reef we went to was in the Marine Protected Area, and it was deeper than the reef we went to yesterday. It also had a lot of sea grass, algae, and dead coral. Ava and I laid out our transects and quadrats and counted a lot of coral all over the reef. While we were doing this, Ava took a picture of me counting squares in my quadrat, and I’m sharing it here (once again, thank you Ava)! After collecting this data, we were sent out to collect sea urchins. I found a lot in coral crevices, but these were really difficult to pull off of the coral. However, that did not deter me from trying. I ended up getting two sea urchins, but as I tried to get another one, the crevice my hand was in had fire coral. Thankfully, only my pinky brushed up against it, but I definitely had a burning sensation there for about an hour. It was worth it, though, because we ended up collecting 52 sea urchins! Additionally, I believe I saw a male Bluelip Parrotfish (Cryptotomus roseus), and I definitely saw more Ocean Surgeonfish (Acanthurus bahianus) and Blue Chromis (Chromis cyanea). Scott also took a video with a damselfish in it that kept making its signature popping sound to show aggression. Damselfish are aggressive toward other fish that come near their algal gardens because they don’t want those fish to eat the algae they’ve worked so hard to cultivate.

Chromis cyanea

After this, we went to another reef in the Marine Protected Area. This reef was much shallower than the other one; it was about as shallow as the reef we went to yesterday. We did manage to collect our data better in this reef than the one from yesterday, though, because the waves were not nearly as strong as yesterday’s. However, Ava and I were very scared we would touch some fire sponge because it was absolutely all over the reef and we were swimming only inches above it. After collecting our data, we were out on the hunt for sea urchins once again. I collected two sea urchins again, but I learned my mistake from last time and only tried to collect them from beneath coral rubble instead of from inside coral crevices. In total, we collected 56 sea urchins from this area!

On our way back to the island, I noticed that I got a sunburn on my hands, so I’m really excited for the tan I’m about to get that starts at my fingers and ends at my wrists. On the island, we had lunch and were given the option to participate in an optional snorkel activity. I opted out of the activity because I was so drained from this morning, but I spent the afternoon working on my field notebook, messaging some friends, and reading my book. I’m very glad I chose to rest.

At the end of the break, we had dinner, were given presentations on the Belize Fisheries Department and the Belize Coast Guard. Overall, today began with lots of work and ended with a well-deserved break. I’m excited to go out onto the reef again tomorrow to collect more data and see more fish!

See y’all next time!

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So Many Fish!

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Hey guys! It’s Michiel again; I’m sure you all missed me : )

This morning started the same as every other morning here. I woke up, got ready, and joined the others for breakfast in the dining hall by 7. After breakfast, everyone in the class put on their snorkeling gear and went out into a new area of the water that’s behind the dining hall. It was full of sea grass and very shallow, but our goal was to find as many interesting species as we could and put them in a bucket. Some notable finds were a lobster, Diadema antillarum (a sea urchin with an interesting history), a sea anemone, and several crabs. In regards to herbivorous fish, though, we caught a Cocoa Damselfish (Stegastes variabilis), and a Bicolor Damselfish (Stegastes partitus). These fish are actually very territorial, so we saw them chasing and trying to bite one another in the bag. Once we laid out all of the species we caught in the wet lab, every person presented on the species caught within their taxa. We passed around lots of algae and talked a lot about different corals; it was so much fun!

After this, we took a break for lunch before going out on a boat in our snorkeling gear to work on a new research question we had come up with earlier in the day. We are trying to identify the correlation between sea urchin prevalence in a reef and the percentage of dead coral in the reef, and we want to see how this changes between Marine Protected Areas and other areas. We went to a reef that wasn’t in an MPA and tried to measure the percentage of dead coral in the area we were looking at using transects and quadrats. However, the waves were really strong and the reef was shallow, so Ava and I kept getting pushed into coral. After collecting this set of data, everyone collected sea urchins for 10 minutes, and we actually found 18 of them!

With our urchins and data collected, we left this reef and went to a new reef that was in an MPA. However, since the wave conditions were so harsh, we just snorkeled instead of collecting data. This reef was really nice. It had a bunch of fish diversity. I had a lot of people coming up to me asking about fish they saw (they mostly saw Yellowtail Damselfish and Blue Tangs). Unfortunately, I saw neither of these, but I did see a Blue Chromis (Chromis cyanea), which is beautiful, and some Threespot Damselfish (Stegastes planifrons). These kept staying very close to the coral, hiding in the crevices as I approached. They tend to do this because they’re pretty small, so they’re great prey for larger fish and are therefore more likely to hide when approached by something larger than them. We also saw a huge lionfish that Scott speared and took with us back to the island! Hopefully we will be feasting on lionfish ceviche tomorrow.

That was most of my day! We had some presentations in the evening that were very interesting (as always), but now it’s time to rest in preparation for tomorrow. Have a great night, guys! (Also here are my very feeble attempts at taking pictures of some of these fish).

Sergeant Major
Cocoa Damselfish
Blue Chromis
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First Day of Experiments!

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Hey guys! It’s Michiel; I’m glad to write to y’all again : )

This morning I woke up and had an amazing breakfast (as always here). After breakfast, Adrienne and Scott wanted us to practice using our quadrats and transects, so they sent us out to collect some data on the island using these tools. Ava and I decided that we wanted to see how much of the island sand was disturbed by crab lines. We set up a 50 yard line from our transect, set our quadrat on either side of the transect, and counted the amount of squares covering sand that was disturbed by crab lines. We ultimately determined that about 9% of the sand in the area we studied was disturbed.

After this riveting experiment, we got to put our tools to use out on the reef! Our professors left us in the wet lab with only instructions to come up with a research question and methodology. As a class, we asked “How does the density of Penicillus green algae change as we get further from the dock?” To test this, each buddy group lined up in the water near the dock and spread out horizontally so that there was at least 10 ft of space between us. Then each of us went off, placing our quadrats at every 10 foot marking on the transect to count the number of Penicillus organisms. Unfortunately, Ava and I did not see a single one (we did see two sea anemones and a starfish, though). We also did not get to see any herbivorous fish since we stayed pretty far away from the patch reefs : (. They’re really only found over there because their diet consists mostly of algae that grows on the reef, so it would be unwise for them to go too far.

Thankfully, the other groups did find some Penicillus, so we pooled our data and determined that the organism increases in density as one goes further from the dock. We believe that Ava and I did not see any because the lush sea grass in our area may outcompete or cover it.  After discussing our results, the class put together a poster and presented our research to Scott and Adrienne.

After these presentations, we went to a very cool area of the island that was just a huge fossilized coral reef. Adrienne showed us lots and lots of different, very well preserved, corals. She identified some of the most common corals we have been seeing in the reef and told us about their importance and history. She even showed us a couple species that are currently rapidly dying off in coral reefs.

After the fossilized coral area, we had a presentation, then dinner, then I presented on herbivorous fish (I hope you all enjoyed), then there were a couple more presentations.

Overall, today was full of activities and it was our first time conducting research in the water! We all had lots of fun and I’m sure we’re all excited for the upcoming days of research in bigger coral reef systems.

Also, here’s a picture Ava took of me holding a starfish (thank you Ava!)