Karnolab

Tag: R/V Shearwater

  • 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…

  • The Open Ocean

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    Some of our more extensive transects aboard the R/V Shearwater were over very deep water. While on these transects, we saw a number of different animals who specialize in life in the open ocean. Among the mammals we saw were Common dolphin, Risso’s dolphin, and a small group of Fin whales. Risso’s dolphins are identified…

  • Shearwaters from the Shearwater

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    Our wonderful vessel, the R/V Shearwater, is named after an equally wonderful seabird. Though there are many species of shearwaters, we saw two- Sooty Shearwaters (four letter species code= SOSH!) and Pink-footed Shearwaters. They weren’t too hard to tell apart- Sooties are much darker than their pink-footed cousins. Usually we would see one or two…

  • Bridge Over Troubled Water

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    Because it was such great weather, we did all of our birds observations from the flying bridge! In April, we were confined to the regular bridge for a couple especially-rough transects. This upper deck had plenty of seats and was great for spotting birds, whales, mola molas and sharks! And scenery of course. It also…

  • Suburban Bound for Santa Barbara

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    On May 17th, with the suburban packed to the gills, we made our way to Santa Barbara harbor to load the R/V Shearwater. This time we had Augie Lagemann’10 with us. Augie is a biology major at Pomona College. He will be a senior next year and these at-sea data will be the basis of…

  • Sagehens at Sea!

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    On April 24th, Kristen’10 and I boarded the R/V Shearwater to begin oceanographic surveys around Santa Barabara Island. The R/V Shearwater is the research vessel of the Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary. The purpose of this project is to assess the seabird distributions around Santa Barbara Island and the physical propoerties of the ocean as well…