Game On in the Lobster Lab!

It is officially official… my experiment is up, running, and awesome!

Mark and I spent the week running around collecting all the lions and coneys that I needed to create size paired blocks for all seven replicates of my experimental design. Included in this was live boat/ free diving all of the artificial reefs, all the trans-reefs not being used in the field experiment as well as a third set of reefs set up for a grad student’s experiment a bunch of years ago. This was A LOT of free diving! Mostly the freediving was lion collection; coneys are a bit too tricky to do on one breath. I was a little apprehensive about doing all of this myself but was super proud of myself for the length of some of my breath holds and how comfortable I was able to get by the end of the first day. I have a long way to go to match everyone else’s skills (Mark worked for NOAA as a free diver clearing abandoned fishing gear from the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands), but a week of free diving has certainly given me a head start. It certainly made me feel pretty hardcore to jump out of a coasting boat onto a reef, search around until I found a little tiny fish, pop up for a breath, have some nets thrown to me, and swim down to catch it solo. Coney collecting is harder since the fish are sneaky and super quick but we were able to get everyone captured with only a couple slightly hairy situations. Thursday, we decided to search for fish in the middle of one of the main feeder channels to the sand flats, which was a great idea until the tide turned. I am ready to declare that nothing will put you in better shape than dragging a full goody bag of fish and a mess of scuba gear up through a screaming current!

All adventures and misadventures aside every fish I need is now measured, weighed, and have gone through their first trial in the Lobster Lab! As previously mentioned, all fish are named, and the experiment has brought a whole new crew of heroes and mobsters in. The lions in the study are: Elasti-Girl, Quail Man, Iceman, Warpath, Space Ghost, Dr. Fate, Martian Manhunter, Nightcrawler, The Silver Surfer, Scuba Steve, Cyclops, Super Grover, Captain Planet, and Aquaman. The experimental mobsters are: Vinnie Two Shoes, Sonny Corlione, Stevey ‘The Rifleman’ Fleming, Babyface Nelson, Santo Trafficante, Anthony ‘Big Tuna’ Accardo, Tough Tony Anastasio, Joey Bananas, Little Nicky Scarfo, Trigger Mike Coppola, Ciro ‘The Artichoke King’ Terranova, Tony Soprano, Sabby Piscitelli, and Pepe LaScala. Also, the groupers from the native predation experiment officially have names. Remember that Nassau grouper have about the same temperament as golden retrievers. The big guys are Duke, Buddy, and Dakota and the interns dubbed the shark Charlie. There are so many experimental fish without names it gets completely ridiculous to try to keep track of. FYI there has been no action in the native predation experiment. So far the groupers and shark have showed little interest in eating their little lions. Good news for the lions, bad news for the local ecosystem. I’ll keep you updated!

Life on the island seems to have a way of just rolling on. The other research team (they study sponge disease) is slowly but surely leaving. Flower and Tim will be back for a much deserved break tomorrow after a long trip to Cat and Eleuthra Islands. The interns have all finished their time on the island and left in the past few days. It seems pretty quite without three other undergrad girls running around the place. We will get a new intern in a few days and have strict instructions from the past interns to haze her appropriately. We might just make her swim in the current at the channel. :)

I just finished the first round of feeding trials out at the lab and neither species has taken the clear lead. They are fed every 2 nights so there is plenty of time. Last night, was a late night getting the first half fed and all of the day’s data entered. I was about ready to curl up on the boat deck partway through the morning but hung in there. I rediscovered the magic of the power nap at lunch! It totally saved me; counting and sizing fish is not too easy when your eyes can’t stay open. So I don’t repeat the experience tomorrow, it’s off to bed soon for me. I am smiling a little extra on the way because Mark really went out of his way to give me a great compliment tonight. I was cleaning up after our dives, copying data sheets, typical stuff and he stopped expressly to thank me for all the work I have done this summer so far. He just said I had been doing an awesome job and was a fantastic assistant and it was just the pick-me-up I needed after a long day. Team Hixon continues to a great group and I am super stoked I’m here!