cookie cutters
9.16.2014
I began my job at Cascadia today, assisting a masters student from Scotland (Natasha) organize her data on very well structured excel sheets. The best part of my day had to be chatting with her on our walk home. Of course, it was no hard task looking at photos of pilot whales all day... And a free Asian lunch wasn't much to complain about. Half of the department is gone, conducting research in wonderful places like Hawaii and Southern California, and a couple more interns have yet to start, so it was a pretty cozy work day.
A huge map of Hawaii caught my glances above my computer as I told Sabre, who I'm working under, briefly about my time there. Perhaps I'll get the chance to return with a purpose. Of course, it's not my computer... I'm borrowing a researcher's space while she's away.
You may be wondering exactly what I'm doing at Cascadia. It goes something like this: I have an excel sheet on one computer screen that is categorized into about 20 columns. I rummage through a bunch of files on the other screen, finding a folder of pictures from photo data collected on a specific pilot whale, in Hawaii, from the date indicated on the excel sheet. Then I enter the information about the presence of cookie cutter shark marks (fresh, healing, scars, amount, where on whale). The program we use allows us to easily scroll through and enhance thousands of photos. It can be a bit tricky for an amateur at times, since we can't be 100% certain by looking at photos, but it's very obvious these whales have been predated on by cookie cutters at some point in their lives.
I decided to do a bit of research on cookie cutters before today (a good excuse to hit up the local library yesterday) and learned that they inhabit deep, tropical waters, most likely undergoing diurnal migrations to feed on whales that perform significant dives. Natasha is interested in their seasonality in Hawaii. Not much is known about their distribution or behavior, since they are not a "sexy" species such as great whites and whale sharks. She made the interesting point that since the sharks inhabit deep, cold water, why aren't they found at higher latitudes? There must be some other aspect of tropical ecosystems that provide this species with something temperate areas lack...
Hmmm...
On a conjoining note (inspired by my time in Australia),
I began my job at Cascadia today, assisting a masters student from Scotland (Natasha) organize her data on very well structured excel sheets. The best part of my day had to be chatting with her on our walk home. Of course, it was no hard task looking at photos of pilot whales all day... And a free Asian lunch wasn't much to complain about. Half of the department is gone, conducting research in wonderful places like Hawaii and Southern California, and a couple more interns have yet to start, so it was a pretty cozy work day.
A huge map of Hawaii caught my glances above my computer as I told Sabre, who I'm working under, briefly about my time there. Perhaps I'll get the chance to return with a purpose. Of course, it's not my computer... I'm borrowing a researcher's space while she's away.
You may be wondering exactly what I'm doing at Cascadia. It goes something like this: I have an excel sheet on one computer screen that is categorized into about 20 columns. I rummage through a bunch of files on the other screen, finding a folder of pictures from photo data collected on a specific pilot whale, in Hawaii, from the date indicated on the excel sheet. Then I enter the information about the presence of cookie cutter shark marks (fresh, healing, scars, amount, where on whale). The program we use allows us to easily scroll through and enhance thousands of photos. It can be a bit tricky for an amateur at times, since we can't be 100% certain by looking at photos, but it's very obvious these whales have been predated on by cookie cutters at some point in their lives.
I decided to do a bit of research on cookie cutters before today (a good excuse to hit up the local library yesterday) and learned that they inhabit deep, tropical waters, most likely undergoing diurnal migrations to feed on whales that perform significant dives. Natasha is interested in their seasonality in Hawaii. Not much is known about their distribution or behavior, since they are not a "sexy" species such as great whites and whale sharks. She made the interesting point that since the sharks inhabit deep, cold water, why aren't they found at higher latitudes? There must be some other aspect of tropical ecosystems that provide this species with something temperate areas lack...
Hmmm...
On a conjoining note (inspired by my time in Australia),
What do you call a fisherman's rubbish...?
A bunch abalone.
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