Our early morning data collection session was a go! Manon collected the dolphin video data and had a silty 4 m underwater visibility. She entered a bit earlier to avoid the glare from direct sunlight. Kami and Elli played with seagrass. Gizmo and Kami played together. And all mom/calf pairs exchanged …
Category: Blog & Field Reports
Weather Roulette!
ometime before sunrise, likely between 2 and 4 AM, it poured buckets. Or maybe it rained “cats & dogs”! We woke to find a muddy slurry for the water near our room and porch. Still, we gave it the college try and took the water taxi to Bailey’s Key at 6:30 AM. And …
Sunny Sunday!
The day began dry with very few clouds! We headed to Bailey’s Key a bit later than last week. The water was a bit dark and silty. Before getting in to collect data, Manon set up the surface GoPro to film the rub-rope in section C3 near Platform 2. You can see …
CSU Departure Day!
Today was CSU’s departure but because we (Kathleen and Manon) have a few more days at AKR, we were able to get another data collection session in. It was a day of dolphin zoomies! Everyone was full of energy and zooming around the main lagoon, as evidenced in …
Final Day of Fun!
Our last full day began much as the others with a morning dolphin data collection and observations. The morning was active with the dolphins – LOTS of leaping and vocalizations and playful activity (feature photo). It made for lots of notes and about 33 minutes of video data with the MVA, two GoPros (front and back), the surface observation stationary GoPro, and the drone. We had a few questions about the data session before returning to …
Double Snorkel, Double Jeopardy!
We actually saw the sun this morning! Data collection went well with the youngest animals engaging in LOTS of play – object play and play with each other. And Kathleen was happy because they played less with her fins! The drone flight started as Kathleen was getting ready to enter (featured photo) and showed us …
Mother Nature has other plans for us!
Though it was drizzling with a sky filled with dark clouds, we went to Bailey’s Key to try to collect observations and data. As the title indicates, Mother Nature had plans counter to ours. Kathleen collected data for about 8 minutes before the underwater visibility dropped to less than 2 meters with a heavier rain. It was a valiant effort to …
Rainy days don’t get in our way!
The forecasted rain held off long enough for John to fly the drone while our CSU teams collected surface observation data and Kathleen collected the underwater observations of the RIMS dolphins. During our data collection session, rainbows were evident in partial and full-sky mode! Several of us took …
Snorkeling the Drop-Off at Maya Key!
Our morning data collection session was characterized by excellent weather. Our first full sunny day! Drone data collection was a success with John getting a good …
Lots of Good Questions, a few answers, and a dog name Rotisserie
Everyone was early for data collection this morning, meeting at the water taxi for our trek to Bailey’s Key. The underwater visibility was improved, and there was a slight current. The dolphins were quite social and spread out throughout the main lagoon … we did not see the nurse shark and think it might have moved on! Mr. French was VERY interested in …
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