Thursday our dolphin trip was unfortunately canceled due to bad weather. However, we interns out Thursday morning and for two SCUBA dives with Bimini Undersea! Our first dive was at “Little Caverns”, a 70ft dive. Cat and Janan were buddies and enjoyed swimming around the large rocky clumps of coral. We especially liked seeing the lionfish! Even if they are pests (and invasive species), they sure look cool! Our second dive was at “The Strip”, which we both really enjoyed. It was a shallower dive to 40ft, and the visibility was great. We saw tons of fish in little schools, two moray eels, and even a small nurse shark! We will be sure to go out again as soon as we can!
It has been super windy all week and Friday was more of the same – plus some. The storm that was brewing in the area meant very few boats were braving the ocean. While we waited out Tropical Storm Bonnie, we interns got our first taste of Bimini video logging! We went over some video footage with Kel and learned how she does it here. It is a little different from what we were working on RIMS video data in CT, but we got the hang of it. Identifying the dolphins is totally different though. It is tricky to get used to comparing their spot patterns, but hopefully we will keep improving our skills. The afternoon was spent doing data analysis and working on a new Squidoo page. Both of us are working on the webpage, which is about the importance of sharks and dolphins in a healthy ecosystem (we’ll let you know when it’s published!). Cat has been working on identifying photos of bottlenose dolphin dorsal fins, and Janan has been entering all the trip logs into the computer. We are all hoping for good weather and lots of successful dolphin trips next week!
Until next time,
Janan, Cat & Kel