Tag Archives: ctenophores

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Last Day on the Reef: Lionfish Ceviche

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Today marks our final day on Glover’s Reef Research Station! We started the day with a morning snorkel, finishing the last of our data collection for our research project we started a few days ago. I heard from Elena that there were some more ctenophores here but I wasn’t lucky enough to see them myself. This time around I was finally able to find and collect some urchins during our urchin survey! We also did one final snorkel in a new area just to see the reefs one last time before our departure. Some highlights include: Caribbean reef squids, another lionfish speared, and I saw a pufferfish!

If you look closely you can see a sea urchin hidden in the dead coral, and on top is a christmas tree worm
Some pretty bladed fire coral (do not touch!)

After returning from our morning snorkel we spent the afternoon combining and analyzing our data from the previous day’s collections, and created a poster presenting our project and its conclusions to our professors. Based on our (limited) data, we were able to see that on patches of reef with a higher percentage of dead corals, there were also a higher number of sea urchins we were able to collect. But there was no clear correlation between a patch being within the protected area and the percent of dead coral. Here is a picture of our lovely poster (I drew the little urchin heart)!

This afternoon we were able to eat a unique delicacy that helps get rid of a pesky invader of the reefs: lionfish ceviche! Over the course of our stay, our professors speared three of them, and we finally put them to good use! But of course as scientists, before we made the ceviche, we dissected each lionfish and determined its sex, weight, length, and saw its stomach contents! My group had an exceptionally large fish that we nicknamed “Main Course”, whose carnage we removed unfortunately spilled onto my lab notebook (good thing its waterproof!). The long awaited ceviche was  delicious!

Dr. Solomon trimming the venomous spines from the lionfish

Then I spent the rest of the night packing up all of my stuff that has become so brutally disorganized over the past few days that I’ve just accepted that nothing in my duffel bag will be entirely clean or easily found. I’ll be very sad to leave this place in the morning (especially in anticipation of the four hour boat ride), but I’m so beyond excited for where we are going next!

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Finally Seeing the Forereef! Cute lil Ctenophores!

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Today we finally got to go snorkeling in part of the atoll that we had heard so many good things about since we’ve stayed here. Until now we had mostly been visiting the patch reefs within the lagoon, but on the oval edge of the atoll there is a huge reef called the forereef that has a huge areas of large reef interspersed between deep grooves that break the intense wave energy. The wind had actually been too strong these last few days to safely attempt seeing it, but this morning we had a rare window of opportunity, and seized it!

This area was much much deeper than anywhere we have snorkeled so far, and it was so deep that it was difficult taking any high resolution pictures of the huge corals below. But most excitingly, I was actually able to spot some little ctenophores (comb jellies) close to us! Comb jellies look like translucent jelly-like forms that don’t sting like jellyfish do, so even though we were right in the middle of a mass of them, we were just fine! It was hard to get any clear view on them because of how translucent they are, but based on what I saw, they look like the sea walnut comb jelly.

Dr. Correa diving down to see some of the reef structures

Comb jelly from the forereef (possibly sea walnut!)

We unfortunately couldn’t stay out there for longer than about 20 minutes because then the waves picked up, and a lot of us got seasick again :(. After recovering, we heard a lecture on the effects of pollution in the ocean from marine debris such as plastics, and designed a dual research project and beach cleanup activity! We recorded the types and amount of debris we were able to collect on the shores around our island. We were able to calculate which areas of the island would be most effective to focus on for future cleanup efforts, and collect over 60 kg of trash! Here is an insanely cool photo of some very well preserved fish remains someone found during the cleanup!

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First Day of Snorkeling: The Mangroves of Madness

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Today was our first day snorkeling out on the reef! We started the day by getting our fins wet in the patch reefs right near the dock  in front of the station. This was so exciting, we got to see the reef in person, and start to identify some of its organisms.

After this initial excursion, we decided to see more patch reefs through a different access point on the island which led us through a mangrove landscape. Mangroves are very cool, the trees have such strong and graceful looking root structures, but getting through this area was miserable because they are host to hordes of mosquitos! We quite literally ran to get in the water to keep them from swarming us, and none of us left unscathed.

But once we were out in the water, we saw so many cool things! It was really interesting to see the diversity of 3D coral structures that can be visible from even a small little patch. Some organisms of note include  a sea cucumber, conch shells, and I even spotted a small shark in the seagrass! Unfortunately, I still have yet to see any jellyfish or ctenophores, but I am still hopeful that we will see some when when we get into deeper waters.

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Stuck on Comb Jellies

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May 25, 2019

Today was a big day for Scyphozoa and Ctenophores, otherwise known as true jellyfish and comb jellies respectively. When we unloaded at one of our experiment locations, we had to quickly get back into the boat when we realized Moon Jellies (Aurelia aurita) were everywhere (they can deliver a painful sting), but that doesn’t mean I didn’t take a picture first.

There were also a lot of comb jellies (unknown species). These jellies look similar to jellyfish but are actually from a completely different phylum and use sticky cells called colloblasts to catch prey rather than stinging cells like jellyfish. This is why Amanda was able to safely hold one in her hand.

Eventually, our marine safety officer Herbie found a reef that wasn’t infested with jellyfish. While he was checking the area, he said he saw lots of squid and lionfish. I didn’t end up finding any squid myself, but I did get to watch Herbie spear one of the lionfish – they’re invasive to the Caribbean and eat a lot of important herbivorous fish populations.

Later, we went to the forereef, which was much deeper than the patch reefs inside the atoll. I got to see some living elkhorn coral (Acropora palmata), a nurse shark, several southern sting rays, and a very linear group of small squid.

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Day 4: Full Circle (05/19/2017)

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I lie on my back on the hammock, swaying gently side-to-side in the breeze. My eyelids float down after a busy morning and afternoon. I witness deep oranges and rusty reds shifting, bursting, and intertwining on the backs of my eyelids, luminescent projections of the intense tropical sunlight. Needless to say, these entrancing visions were enough to lull me to sleep.

This morning I felt quite different – energized and adventurous. Soon after breakfast, my classmates and I measured the sizes of the urchins we caught yesterday at the Marine Protected Area (MPA). We then snorkeled at a non-MPA and carefully collected urchins there. Interestingly, the urchins tended to be larger and more numerous at the MPA. However, the non-MPA was home to the largest urchin we found, a long spine sea urchin (Diadema antillarum) that measured 5.8 cm in diameter.

With its mounds of different corals, the reef visited today was teeming with a plethora of diverse colorful creatures. Some notable sightings included a green sea urchin (Lytechinus variegatus), spiny brittle stars (Ophiocoma paucigranulata), and numerous ctenophores. The green sea urchin was about 4 inches in diameter and found on the seafloor. The spiny brittle stars, found under rubble, had central disks of about an inch in diameter and arms about 3 inches long. The brittle stars would try to move back under the rubble when exposed. None of the echinoderms were visibly interacting with other organisms. Today’s most spectacular sighting was a spotted trunkfish (Lactophyrus bicaudalis); its dynamic black and white speckles contrasted with the mellow blue backdrop of the ocean.

After spending the afternoon discussing my class’ data collected and observations noted, I was exhausted. We had an hour until dinner, so I lied on my back on the hammock.