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Oyster Reef Ecology | On the Reef

Day 7: October Oyster Push- Last Day

by Rob Diaz de Villegas October 29, 2010
by Rob Diaz de Villegas October 29, 2010 0 comment
Rob Diaz de Villegas WFSU-TV

Thursday, October 28- Finish up, head back home

P1020010

(Farthest to nearest) Hanna, Tanya, and Cristina perform some of the more glamorous work of this trip- cracking oysters apart and finding spat (oyster babies). David needed everyone on his team to perform, or this week would be wasted.

IGOR chip- biogeographic 150A while back, I was talking to Randall or David, I forget which one, and they were telling me about building a research crew.  Obviously you need people who have the knowledge and skills to do what needs to be done- from identifying fish to driving a boat, or setting a gill net.  But just as important, they said, was that you had people you could get along with, since you practically live with them sometimes.

Weeks like this one are where building the team pays off.  When you’re getting bitten up by gnats on an oyster reef at 6:45 in the morning, you don’t want a crew member sniping at another about losing a fish out of the gill net.  David remarked to me that the morale of this team had stayed strong, despite the schedule always changing and everyone having to shoulder more of the load while David got the tiles ready.  They did a lot of work on their own, and made it possible to get everything done even as plans shifted.

On a day like today, it was good that David has the crew he has.

P1010953

A swarm of gnats hovers over the oyster reef water.

6:45 AM– Retrieved fish from nets, deployed traps.

After a night of battling cockroaches in their “haunted” house, they might have been happier to be out on oyster reefs at this early hour.  They might have, had it not been for the no see-ums.  They were getting eaten alive, which made it hard to work.  And it got worse from there, as if the universe decided to pile it on in this last day.

As early as it was, the birds had gotten to their fish before they did and there were no stomachs to examine.  And then there were the injuries.  David cut his finger on a catfish spine, and then, within about ten minutes, a stone crab got a hold of Hanna’s finger and inflicted some pain.  They’re both okay.  Their truck, however, is a little worse off.

Truck accident in Jacksonville

Banged up over the course of the week, the crew- and their truck- are ready to come home.

When they got back, they glued spat onto tiles one more time to deploy this afternoon.

3:00 PM– Tanya, Hanna, and Cristina retrieved the traps and set the tiles.

7:00 PM– The girls headed back to the FSU Coastal & Marine Lab.  When they got there, they cleaned all of their gear, even though it was late.  They figured that it was better to wash the salt off sooner than later.

So that was the week.  They’ll go back to each of the sites about every six weeks, though it won’t always be this intensive.  David, Jeb (SC/ GA), and Jon (NC) will start to see seasonal patterns in the fish that they find- when do certain fish tend to show up on what reef?  They’ll check in on their tiles and take photos, and over the months the photos should play like a flip book in showing the growth of the oysters on each site.  They’ll gain understanding, and they’ll run into more road blocks.  They have about two-and-a-half years left on this study, so while Thursday was the last day of the push, they’re nowhere near the end of the road.

P1010964

Assuming no one tampers with them, we should be able to watch these oysters grow up over the next year.

Check back in a couple of weeks for wrap-up posts from David and Tanya.

Tide Times and height (ft.) for Jacksonville, October 28, 2010
Low- 6:44 AM (0.3)

David’s research is funded by the National Science Foundation.

We’d love to hear from you! Leave your comments and questions below:
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biogeographicexperimentsFlorida State UniversityFSU Coastal and Marine LabJacksonvillemarine biologymarine ecologyNational Science Foundationno see-umsNSFoysteroyster bedoyster reefoyster spatpredatorpreyroctoberpushsciencestone crab
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Rob Diaz de Villegas

Rob Diaz de Villegas is a senior producer for WFSU-TV, covering outdoors and ecology. After years of producing the music program OutLoud, Rob found himself in a salt marsh with a camera, and found a new professional calling as well. That project, the National Science Foundation funded "In the Grass, On the Reef," spawned the award winning WFSU Ecology Blog. Now in its tenth year, the Ecology Blog recently wrapped its most ambitious endeavor, the EcoCitizen Project. Rob is married with two young sons, who make a pretty fantastic adventure squad.

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Day 6: October Oyster Push- Home Stretch
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Eastern bumblebee on blueberry flower.

With every passing day, spring brings us more flowers, and more pollinators (and many other insects as well).

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Florida milkvetch (Astragalus obcordatus) in the Munson Sandhills

When I test out a new camera, I usually head to a random spot in the Munson Sandhills and take a series of videos and photos. This small flower caught my eye, as almost nothing was in bloom. I identified it as Florida milkvetch (Astragalus obcordatus) in iNaturalist, and it was confirmed.
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iNaturalist became a part of the WFSU Ecology Blog during the EcoCitizen Project in 2019.  Since then, we’ve used it to help identify the many plants and animals we see on our shoots.  And on the Backyard Blog, we show how it can be used to identify weeds and garden insects, to help figure out what’s beneficial or a possible pest.  Below is the iNaturalist profile belonging to WFSU Ecology producer Rob Diaz de Villegas.

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