Karnolab

Category: Channel Islands

  • Gone Fishing

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    Written by Ali Corley On our last trip to Santa Barbara Island this May, we did an extra survey of fish abundancy and diversity on the Osborne shelf in addition to the usual bird observations and net tows on the regular transects.  Well, in other words, we spent several extra hours on top of the…

  • Wanted: A Pair of Sea Legs

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    written by Ali Corley This semester I joined Professor Karnovsky’s lab with the hope of being able to study birds and do field work in beautiful places.  I had just gotten really interested in bird ecology after a semester abroad in Costa Rica where I studied bird song in the sloping trails of the cloud…

  • Montrose Mania Starts Again!

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    After our winter hibernation (not filled with sleep but with plankton-counting and thesis writing), the Channel Islands crew returned to Santa Barbara Island. We’ve already completed two cruises—one over Spring Break in mid-March and one in the beginning of April. Both expeditions were great successes. Ali Corley (PO ’11) and Nick Tyack (PO ’11) got…

  • Summer Posters

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    At the end of our time in the Karnovsky lab this summer, Kristen and I created Posters displaying some of the preliminary data we analyzed since our trip to the Channel Islands. Kristen’s beautiful poster, titled “Murrelets on the Move: Seasonal Density of Xantus’s Murrelets near Santa Barbara Island,” discussed how the distribution of XAMU…

  • Murrelet Caves on Anacapa

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    Xantus’s murrelets do not make nests of their own. Instead, they seek out the darkest, most protected areas they can find to lay their eggs. On Anacapa Island, this usually means they nest among the cracks and crags in one of the many caves around the perimeter of the island. In May, Kristen and I…

  • A Day Aboard the R/V Shearwater

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    I had never been on a boat trip longer than a day before beginning field research aboard the R/V Shearwater, and I was pleasantly surprised to find that there was a full kitchen area and sleeping quarters aboard, as well as tons of deck space for our CTD (conductivity, temperature, depth sensor) and net tow…

  • Data Crunching Data

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    As you all know, we have not been on a boat for a month. In fact, despite all these lovely blog entries about the high-seas and the creatures that live there, we’ve been in lab for several weeks working with data and creating colorful graphs and figures! Here is a sample of just one of…

  • These Are the Voyages of the Bio Suburban…

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    Sorry for the lack of posts from the Channel Island crew! Augie and I went on a whirlwind tour of the Bay Area last week, and were too busy to keep up on our blogging. But here’s a recap! Last Tuesday Augie and I loaded into our trusty suburban (with significantly less gear than last…

  • The Elusive Hypoleucus

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    Two subspecies of Xantus’s Murrelets are currently recognized; scrippsi and hypoleucus. These birds look different, make different calls, breed in different places, and recently a genetic test was done to prove they are genetically diverse. Whoever decided they were the same species was a little confused. The vast majority of the murrelets we saw were…

  • The Beautiful Brown Pelican

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    We often saw groups of Brown Pelicans flying in formation around both Anacapa and Santa Barbara Island during our voyage. These birds were everywhere! Pelicans prefer to nest on islands that are not inhabited by humans, making Anacapa and SBI prime nesting sites. Though featherless and helpless after hatching, immature Brown Pelicans grow quickly and…