Author Archives: kightp

About kightp

Pat Kight is the web and digital media specialist for Oregon Sea Grant at Oregon State University.

Live fish, crabs, survive post-tsunami trip aboard Japanese boat

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Oplegnathus-fasciatus-WDFW-photox250Scientists at Oregon State University’s Hatfield Marine Science Center are examining a handful of Japanese fish that may have survived a nearly two-year trip aboard a small fishing boat torn off the Japanese coast by the 2011 tsunami.

The fish – Oplegnathus fasciatus, known as Barred knifejaw or Striped beakperch – were found in the bottom of a Japanese boat that washed ashore at Long Beach, WA on March 22. The vessel is one of a growing number of large items cast to sea by the Japanese tsunami that have made their way across the ocean to Pacific Northwest shores.

Sam Chan, Oregon Sea Grant’s invasive species specialist, said the fish species normally are found only as far east as Hawaii. Scientists aren’t yet sure whether the fish traveled all the way from Japan, or if they somehow got onboard the derelict vessel as it crossed the ocean. “Either way, it’s an interesting case of organisms ‘rafting’ across the ocean,” Chan said.

OSU’s Jessica Miller, a marine fisheries ecologist with the HMSC-based Coastal Oregon Marine Experiment Station, as four of the fish and is examining their stomach contents and otoliths (specialized bones found in the ears of fish and other species) for insight into what the fish had been eating and the environmental conditions they encountered during their transit. The fifth fish is on display at the Seaside Aquarium.

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Explore behind the scenes at HMSC Marine Science Day

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NEWPORT, Ore. – Oregon State University’s Hatfield Marine Science Center invites public to explore its marine science labs and Visitor Center,  “behind the scenes”  on Saturday, April 13, when the Newport facility hosts its annual Marine Science Day.

The free event, which runs from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., will feature scientists and educators from OSU, Oregon Sea Grant, federal and state agencies, Oregon Coast Aquarium, and the nearby NOAA Marine Operations Center-Pacific. It is a chance for the public to explore one of the nation’s leading marine science and education centers.

An full schedule of events is available at: hmsc.oregonstate.edu/marinescienceday

In addition to a varietyof marine science presentations, two research themes will be highlighted. One is the science behind bycatch reduction devices, which will be featured by researchers from NOAA Fisheries, Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, OSU, Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission, and Foulweather Trawl, a Newport netmaker.

Marine Science Day visitors will see actual bycatch reduction devices and have an opportunity to view videos showing how fish are excluded or retained, depending on their size, swimming ability or other characteristic. Other research will highlight genetics or other tools used to distinguish between wanted and unwanted catch. Scientists will be on hand to answer questions and discuss their research.

“Visitors will learn not only about the problem of bycatch but also about the solutions, which range from simple and elegant to complex and cutting-edge,” said Maryann Bozza, program manager of the center. “All of the different HMSC research displays on bycatch reduction will be grouped together.”

A second theme will be wave energy, highlighting the efforts of the OSU Northwest National Marine Renewable Energy Center to improve and facilitate testing of wave energy devices and evaluate their potential effects on marine habitats. HMSC’s Sarah Henkel, a senior research assistant professor in the OSU Department of Zoology, will present an update of wave energy developments on the Oregon Coast.

Henkel’s talk begins at 3 p.m. in the Visitor Center auditorium.

Among other highlights of Marine Science Day:

  • Visitor Center activities will include new wave energy exhibits, the recently dedicated Japanese tsunami dock exhibit and a new interactive wave tank.
  • The center’s new octopus, named “Miss Oscar,” will be featured in a 1 p.m. interpretive talk and octopus feeding demonstration.
  • Visitors can take self-guided tours through the facility’s marine research labs, library and classrooms, where scientists will have interactive exhibits explaining their research. Guided tours of HMSC’s seawater facilities and aquatic animal husbandry laboratory will also be offered.

A number of educational activities for children and families will be available, presented by Oregon Sea Grant, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Oregon Coast Aquarium.

The OSU Hatfield Marine Science Center is located at 2030 S.E. Marine Science Drive in Newport, just south of the Highway 101 bridge over Yaquina Bay.

Researchers test new excluder device to reduce halibut bycatch

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OSU researchers working with the groundfish fishing industry in the Pacific Northwest have tested a new “flexible sorting grid excluder” – a type of bycatch reduction device that shows promise to significantly reduce the incidental bycatch of Pacific halibut from commercial bottom trawl fishermen. In a series of tests that included 30 tows off the Washington coast, commercial fishermen were able to reduce the number of halibut taken as bycatch by 57 percent, while retaining 84 percent of the targeted groundfishes, according to Mark Lomeli of the Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission, a multi-state agency charged with sustainably managing Pacific Ocean resources. The findings are being published in the journal Fisheries Research.
Incidental bycatch is a significant issue in many coastal regions including the Pacific Northwest. It occurs when fishing operations result in the discard of non-targeted fish and invertebrates, or through accidental interactions with mammals, seabirds and sea turtles. It is of particular concern, resource managers say, when these “bycaught” species are overfished, threatened or endangered.

Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2013-03-bycatch-groundfish-trawling.html#jCp

Japan Times: Washed-up dock stirs awareness in Oregon

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NEWPORT  – When a massive dock drifted across the Pacific Ocean from Japan to the U.S. West Coast after the Great East Japan Earthquake, it brought along more than the invasive “wakame” kelp and mussels that were attached to it. The city of Newport, Oregon, where the docked beached itself last June, noticed the high interest it was generating and put it to good use.

Oregon Sea Grant’s Mark Farley, manager of the Visitor Center at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center, describes how a piece of a 20-meter, 100-ton concrete and metal dock, ripped from its moorings in Misawa, Japan by the devasting 2011 earthquake and tsunami and deposited over a year later on the Oregon coast, is serving as a tool to educate visitors and coastal residents about our own risks of disaster.

Read the complete story in the KYODO/Japan Times

Spring Break brings Whale Watch Week to Oregon coast

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Gray Whale - photo courtesy of M. SpieringSpring Whale Watch Week coincides with spring break for most Oregon schools and universities, and that makes March 23-30 a great time to head for the coast and look for whales.

Hundreds of giant gray whales, including females and their new calves, travel past Oregon on their way to their spring and summer feeding grounds off Alaska. Many come fairly close to shore, and it’s not unusual to see their spouts – and sometimes the animals themselves – as they swim northward.

OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center is open daily from 10 am to 5 pm during Whale Watch Week, with special marine mammal programs and activities.

Trained volunteers will be stationed at prime whale-watching spots in coastal parks to help visitors learn how to spot the animals, and to share what they know about their life history, biology and migratory habits. Look for the “Whale Watching Spoken Here” signs.

Learn more:

  • Whalespoken.org, the official Oregon Parks & Recreation whale-watch site, includes maps showing the best whale viewing areas along the coast.
  • Free .pdf downloads of Oregon Sea Grant’s popular Gray Whales brochure, in English and Spanish versions.
  • Oregon State University’s Marine Mammal Institute, a multidisciplinary program dedicated to the study of whales and other marine mammals.

Science: Nation’s research fleet declines as needs increase

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Science magazine reports on the declining state of the US marine research fleet:

“Fewer scientists are going to sea as a result of a shrinking science fleet, flat budgets, and skyrocketing costs. At the same time, oceanographers are using a growing array of high-tech devices—such as satellites, gliders, and vast networks of sensors tethered to the sea floor—to remotely collect more data than ever before without getting wet.”

The article looks in depth at the state of the University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System (UNOLS) fleet, operated by a consortium of 62 universities and government laboratories including Oregon State University, and finds its vessels aging, being retired and not being replaced.

In January, the National Science Foundation named OSU the lead institution on  a project to finalize the design and coordinate the construction of as many as three new coastal research vessels to bolster the marine science research capabilities of the United States.

OSU is slated to receive nearly $3 million to coordinate the design phase of the project – but actual construction of the new ships depends on Congress appropriating funds to build them, at a cost estimated at  $290 million over 10 years. The final number constructed, and the geographic positioning of these vessels, will be determined by the National Science Foundation based on geographic scientific requirements and availability of funding.

The Science article, meanwhile, notes that some existing research vessels are spending more time in port, as rising operation costs and funding cutbacks make it difficult for scientists to pay for the at-sea time they need. At the same time, technological advances are providing new tools that allow researchers like OSU’s Kipp Shearman – cited in the article for his pioneering use of remotely controlled robotic “gliders” to gather data that once would have required them to spend weeks at sea.

Read the entire article at Science OnLine

Science on Tap: Dan Bottom on sustaining salmon

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Dan BottomNEWPORT – Dan Bottom, fisheries biologist with NOAA’s Northwest Fisheries Science Center, steps up to the bar to talk about salmon at the next Science on Tap event on March 13 at Brewer’s on the Bay.

“Celebrating Diversity: Sustaining Pacific Salmon in a Changing World” is Bottom’s theme for the evening, which takes place in the downstairs Board room at Rogue Ale’s South Beach waterfront location. Doors open at 5:30 p.m. and the talk begins at 6; the event is free and open to the public. Appetizers will be served, and additional food and drinks available for purchase from the menu.

Bottom, editor and contributing author for Oregon Sea Grant’s 2011 book Pathways to Resilience: Sustaining Pacific Salmon in a Changing World, will discuss the importance of salmon diversity and the attributes of resilience. His talk will draw from the book’s 11 peer-reviewed articles, including case studies of salmon and salmon fisheries, and will explore management actions that draw on salmon life history and genetic diversity to maintain salmon populations into the future.

Bottom notes, “Salmon exhibit a wide variety of life history traits. These include salmon runs and populations that exhibit differences in migration timing, duration of estuary rearing and size when the salmon enter the ocean.” Healthy, diverse watersheds, says Bottom, provide habitat connections that not only sustain diverse salmon life histories but also provide diverse social and economic opportunities for people.

The 392-page, full-color book, with a prologue by Governor John Kitzhaber, will be available at the event for purchase and author signing. It can also be purchased online from Oregon Sea Grant.

Science on Tap is a regular program of OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center, co-sponsored by Oregon Sea Grant, NOAA, the Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission, MidCoast Watersheds Council, Native Fish Society, and The Wetlands Conservancy. For more information about the event, call 541-867-0234.

West Coast Sea Grant programs offer social science grant opportunities

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Sea Grant programs in Oregon, Washington and California are inviting regional research proposals that address topics of social science and human dimensions related to Sea Grant’s national goals for

  • Healthy coasts and oceans
  • Safe and sustainable fisheries and aquaculture
  • Resilient coastal communities and economies
  • Environmental literacy and workforce development.

The hope is to attract a wide range of social scientists – economists, anthropologists, geographers, community planners, political scientists, psychologists, sociologists, learning scientists, historians, communications and decision scientists –  to explore some important aspect of human interaction within coastal and marine ecosystems.

Oregon Sea Grant, Washington Sea Grant, California Sea Grant and University of Southern California Sea Grant have pooled their resources to commit a total of $700,000 (subject to available funds) to support between two and four regional projects for 2014-2016.  Projects must be regional in scope and research teams must be made up of investigators from at least two institutions of higher education within the three-state region.

Projects will be selected through an open, competitive, peer-review process. The deadline for pre-proposal applications – which must be made through California Sea Grant – is 11:59 pm PDT, April 1, 2013.

For full information, and to learn how to submit preproposals, visit the California Sea Grant Website.

Tsunami dock piece to be dedicated March 10

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Cleaning the tsunami dock (Photo: OSU Hatfield Marine Science Center)NEWPORT – A new tsunami awareness exhibit, featuring a piece of the massive Japanese dock that washed ashore at Agate beach last year, will be dedicated at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center in a public ceremony and grand opening on Sunday, March 10.

The public ceremony, which runs from 2-4 pm,  marks the two-year anniversary of the devastating earthquake and tsunami that hit northern Japan. Sponsors include Oregon Sea Grant, the HMSC and the City of Newport.

The dock was among the first – and largest – fragments of debris to wash up on Pacific Northwest shores more than a year after the magnitude 9.03 undersea megathrust earthquake off the coast of Japan on March 11, 2011. The dock’s arrival on Agate Beach last June, sparked concern over the potential spread of non-native plants and marine animals, thousands of which were found alive and clinging to the dock.

Teams of state Parks and Recreation workers, scientists and volunteers scoured the dock’s surface and scorched it with blow-torches to destroy the organisms – and also collected specimens for identification and analysis by researchers at the HMSC.

The dock, roughly the size of a railroad boxcar and weighing tons, was sawn into pieces for disposal, and one section was saved to be placed at the Hatfield Center as a memorial to the Japanese disaster – and to aid in educating visitors about the risks of similar tsunamis generated by subduction zone quakes off the Oregon coast.  On initial delivery, however, the concrete-and-steel segment was discovered to be too big for its site, and was hauled to the Port of Newport docks to be recut to fit the space.

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OSU researcher seeks better rip current forecasts

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Rip current warning signRip currents – strong channels of water flowing seaward from the shore – kill more Americans than do hurricanes. Caught off guard, people are swept out to sea, where they exhaust themselves swimming against the pull of the strong, outrushing current, and drown.

While scientists and the National Weather Service have made progress predicting the probability of rip currents in given locations, they so far lack a method ot accurately forecast whether and when they’ll actually occur, and how strong they might be.

Oregon State University’s Tuba Ozkan-Haller is hoping to change all that. For the last five years, she’s been working to develop a model to identify the location of rip currents up to a day in advance – something that would be a boon to swimmers, surfers and lifeguards around the world, and could save hundreds of lives a year.

Ozkan-Haller, an associate professor in OSU’s College of Earth, Ocean & Atmospheric Sciences, surveys the topography of the ocean floor to figure out how waves will travel over it; this allows her to see how that mass of water can escape back from shore via a rip current. She plugs these factors into a mathematical model she developed that predicts where and when rip currents will occur – and how strong they will be.

Helping her efforts are cutting-edge surveying technologies that allow her to observe properties at the water’s surface and infer the underlying bathymetry from those observations. This is a much more efficient and accurate way to get a sense of the sea floor than the standard procedure of surveying from a boat.

“I’m totally floored by how well we can do compared to traditional surveying methods,” says Ozkan-Haller. “You can set up a radar system near a beach and get continuous estimates of the bathymetry as it evolves from day to day without ever stepping foot into the water.”

The rip current effort is part of Ozkan-Haller’s broader interest in underwater coastal topography and how it helps shape the ocean’s waves. Oregon Sea Grant has supported some of that work, including a related project to develop a model for predicting nearshore wave patterns and heights. A reliable wave forecast system would benefit navigation, fishing, transportation, beach safety and even wave-energy siting.

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