Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Coming Back Around

Tuesday July 26th, 2011

Today we woke up to find all the coordinators asleep! They all pulled the 3am shift so we could be rested and rarin’ to go for today. Aren't they sweet? :) After breakfast, we milled around finishing projects and working on some concept mapping until about 10am. We also pulled into Duluth. Although I’ve been having a marvelous time and I’ve really enjoying the time I’ve spent with the people I’ve met, it was good to see Duluth appear on the horizon. It was like seeing an old friend after you return from adventure. For one last time, we all piled at the bow of the ship and waved to the pier as we passed under the Aerial Lift Bridge. Bitter sweet.


Our coordinators woke up and met us in the classroom where Joel Hoffman finally presented his research on isotopes. :) [Earlier in the trip, we had a stressful moment of all the scientists trying to explain tracing isotopes to us… we excitedly cheered and hollered when Joel was jokingly introduced] As it turns out, isotopes like 15N can be traced in fish to determine where they have been getting their nutrients – nearshore, tributaries, or offshore. These isotopes are also found in water. Snow, for example shows signs of where the water came from based on the isotopes they contain.




A group of educators studying the St. Louis River Estuary through NERR (National Estuary Research Reserve) joined us for the rest of the day. They had spent the previous day starting their research on the river and wanted to take another look at the harbor. After we got to know each other a little, we all split up into a rotation schedule and those of us in the Shipboard and Shoreline workshop trained the NERR educators in at the stations. We stopped at three locations, one right in front of the Blatnik Bridge, one by the Wisconsin Point entrance, and the other out in the open lake. We took water quality tests with the rosette sampler, a plankton and benthic sample, and secchi disk reading. The samples were analyzed in the lab, but were not taken into the scientist’s projects because the plankton stay in deeper waters during the day as described before.

We also saw many other ships and sites while we were out and about in the harbor today.








After dinner we all got together to discuss the differences in the samples that we took. Joel Hoffman discussed what happens when the river meets the lake. He compared the nutrient contents and the difference in the physical water properties. We're now going out on land to play. Tomorrow, we present our projects at Great Lakes Aquarium!!

No comments:

Post a Comment