Data collection was early but not bright … it was overcast this morning! The featured group photo was actually from yesterday before our encounter and swim. It’s bright and shows our anticipation! Even though this morning was cloudy, the dolphins were VERY active. Gracie and Alita both seemed to be corralling their young and those offspring of others. Champ and Rocky were “arguing;” Trixie was the most curious about the MVA ever in her life! Poli tried to keep Georgie in line while Kami fluctuated between the boys, the MVA, and her mom! And Sandy spent time with Champ when he wasn’t chasing Rocky!
After breakfast, we hopped onto the Albacore vessel for our double reef-snorkel morning. We traveled inside and outside the reef to Pristine Bay to snorkel on a shipwreck that is partially submerged. It ran aground on the reef years ago. There is abundant fish life on and near the wreck. The current was a bit strong, but it was a lovely snorkel. We saw a giant stingray with two remoras, several parrotfish, and sea stars. Don was the lucky fellow to see a reef (black-tipped?) shark on his dive. We spent about 40 min in the water and then moved a bit to jump back in to see more sea stars.
We traveled back toward AKR for our official second snorkel (even though, if you’re counting it was our third entry!) on Rocky’s Reef. LOTS of fish, and even 2-3 filefish foraging. Being waterlogged all morning was a blast.
The afternoon brought lunch (we were HUNGRY!) and a sea turtle lecture from Jen. We learned much about this aquatic reptile. Next were our one-on-one meetings with Shane and Kathleen and Manon about our project topics (3 research proposals and 6 PSAs!). We watched the morning video from data collection and practiced recognizing dolphin IDs. Then we had another partial Q&A session before dinner. We also need to mention that the CSU streak is still alive! Anna won the Hermit crab race at last night’s Fiesta event! Woohoo!
Avery – Not 1 snorkel session but 2.5 snorkel sessions today 😃
Evelyn – I loved riding the waves on the boat a lot (on the way to our snorkeling).
Anna- I really enjoyed the sea turtle presentation today. I thought it was a very interesting subject that I did not know much about until today.
Sarah – I enjoyed seeing all the sergeant majors, parrotfish, and humongous sea stars.
Katie – I saw my first shipwreck while snorkeling today!
Olivia – When Georgie came up to platform 1 this morning and said hello, it made me very happy.
Savanna – Saw the biggest stingray of my life and really enjoyed our discussions again today.
Megan – I had a lot of fun snorkeling with the group today and it was cool getting to experience my desktop screen saver in real life.
Dominick – The reef was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. And I’m glad I know what type of tree everyone wants to be when reincarnated. and … best day ever!
Don – 🦈
Manon – It was really cool seeing a filefish swallowing ctenophores on the last morning snorkel.
Shane – Good snorkels. Good discussions. I’m surprised how fast the week has gone. Looking forward to our final full day tomorrow. P.S. looking forward to some of the good ideas for projects.
Tomorrow is our last full day, and we look forward to data collection and what the rest of the day will bring!
Cheers
The CSU nonuplets