July 15th Day 25

Once again the weather was not favorable for work offshore. Since we didn't need the boat for water sampling, Russ and Sally decided to take it because the big blue boat that we had been taking to the west side of the island has been having engine issues and they couldn't take it out. However I could not go with them because the boat they were taking can only fit 5 divers max. Instead I went out with Keith to do instrument work on the north shore. Instruments typically are in deeper water so whenever I go out with him I do my deepest dives. Today I worked at around 60 feet which is reasonably deep. While we were waiting on the bottom for Keith and Jessica to finish working on the ADCP (acoustic doppler current profiler) I spotted a black tip reef shark about 70 feet away from me which was the closest I have been to one yet. These guys are typically smaller sharks that are around the 4-6 foot range and are very docile. I tried to get a little closer to take a good picture but it cruised away off into the distance. I got one picture off before it was too far away but it is reasonably blurry because the shark was moving. After the dive we came back and cleaned the instruments we collected. Surprisingly the instruments were pretty clean and weren't crusted over with algae too much. Often these instruments are deployed in the field for 6 months and over that period they can become fouled by excess settlement of algae on their outsides. But since they were not too bad the cleaning didn't take all that long. After that, I got to play around with a saw to cut through some steel hooks that were corroded and used to connect some of the boats to their trailers. After I got done with that, there was not too much left to do. I worked with Russ for a while to clean some tile pieces and we talked about music and how he appreciated my musical tastes very much compared to one of the other interns. He along with many of the other people working here were happy when they found out her ipod stopped working because she would use the speakers while she was cleaning instruments to listen to her music and everyone hated it. Russ asked me, "Are you sure Keith didn't run it over with the land rover?" We had a good laugh talking about that and then we talked some about what the plan is for the rest of the trip a bit. Once we get done surveying the island, we will start doing more experimental work out on the fore reef off of Cook's Bay. While we were talking about the research, he mentioned that parrot fish, which are common herbivores here, can at times damage coral while foraging for algae. I asked him a question at that point about at what level may this be a negative impact for the coral despite removal of its space and light competitor in algae. He thought that was a very interesting question and actually proposed that when I have time after we set up the planned experiments that I actually try to conduct my own experiment to examine this question. That was really exciting to hear from him that I can and will develop my own experiment this summer out on the fore reef to address a rather important question to the project. Once that conversation finished it was a bit before 5 pm so I decided to go for a bike ride while it was still light out to take some pictures. I rode over close to the Hilton and took some pictures of the bungalows and the surrounding scenery. While I was doing this, the cruise ship that had been docked in Cook's Bay for the past couple of days took off and I got some cool pictures of it making its way out to sea. The ride back was a bit sketchy for me because there was much more traffic on the road and they do not have a bike lane which makes things a bit tight on the road at times. However I was pleasantly surprised to see cars wait for oncoming traffic to pass before passing me on the road so they could go a little onto the other side of the road to avoid hitting me which is a nice and considerate thing to do. When I got back I worked a bit more on the blog and then had dinner. We had some roasted chicken and veggie dish for dinner along with these fried bread pieces that reminded me of funnel cake. They were covered in powder sugar and boy were they good. Elizabeth who was cooking tonight made 3 batches which was too much for all of us to handle. After that I had a chat with Keith and then headed off to my room. Now after I have done some research on the parrot fish project that I will be doing later this summer, I think I am going to go to bed. Until later.