Category Archives: HMSC Visitor Center

Video: Great White Shark Necropsy

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A new video is available documenting part of the public dissection of a 12-foot great white shark that was featured in an earlier blog post.  The shark died after becoming entangled in the ropes of a crab pot, but the shark’s death may mean educational benefits to scientists.

William Hanshumaker, a marine science educator at the Hatfield Marine Science Center, explains: “There are researchers from throughout the country who are interested in what we’re doing here and have requested sample materials…. This is also an opportunity for the public to observe first-hand this unique creature and how scientists conduct research and share information.”

The 2-minute video is a time-lapse sequence showing the fin removal portion of the necropsy.

Whale Watch Week is coming up

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Gray whaleVolunteers take their positions at state parks up and down the Oregon Coast next Saturday to help visitors look for migrating gray whales during the annual Winter Whale Watch Week, Dec. 26-Jan. 1.

The program, launched by Oregon Sea Grant’s Don Giles in 1978 and now coordinated by the Oregon State Parks and Recreation’s Depoe Bay Whale Center, draws thousands of winter visitors to the coast each year, armed with binoculars in hopes of spotting some of the giant marine mammals as they migrate south to their  breeding grounds off Mexico’s Baja California.

To learn more about whales and their migrations before you head to the coast, download the free Sea Grant publication, Gray Whales, from our Web site, in English and Spanish language versions, as a printable .pdf or a fast-loading text version. Also available: A Watching Whales fact sheet with tips for spotting the animals – and how to tell a whale spout from a wave –  is also available.

When you need to warm up, stop by OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Visitor Center, open from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. every day of Whale Watch Week except Jan. 1  with special programs and activities, including a daily marine mammal program in Hennings Auditorium featuring hands-on baleen, skulls and other whale “biofacts”.  The Center is also a great place to find out where whales are being seen – they’ll be keeping a running list of reported sightings and locations.

For more information, including a list of parks where volunteers will be stationed, visit the Whale Spoken Here Web site.

Sea Grant partnership wins Presidential award

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Coastal America Logo

The Ocean Conservation and Education Alliance Northwest (OCEAN), a partnership of Oregon Sea Grant and several other coastal groups, will receive a 2009 Coastal America Partnership Award for outstanding efforts to restore and protect the coastal environment.

The Presidential award represents the highest level national recognition for  outstanding  multi-agency, multi-stakeholder collaborations that pool resources from many sources to accomplish coastal restoration, preservation, protection and education projects.

The award was announced on Nov. 6 by the Coastal America Partnership, an action-oriented, collaborative partnership of federal agencies, state and local governments, and private organizations. The partners work together to protect, preserve, and restore our nation’s coasts, accomplishing tasks that no one group could accomplish alone.

OCEAN is receiving the award for “efforts to bring together a network of innovative educators … to engage students and inspire ocean science literacy,” according to Coastal America director Virginia K. Tippie.

OCEAN started three years ago as a joint effort by Oregon Sea Grant’s marine education program at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport, the Oregon Coast Aquarium and the Lincoln County School District to help make local k-12 students among the most ocean-literate in the country.

Read more …

“Medicines from the Sea” lecture at HMSC

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NEWPORT – Dr. George Robert Pettit, a noted biochemist, will talk about “Medicines from the Sea – From marine organism constituents to human cancer clinical trials” this Wednesday, Nov. 11, at the OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center.

The lecture, which is free and open to the public, begins at 7 p.m. in the HMSC Hennings Auditorium.

Dr. Pettit,  professor of chemistry at Arizona State University, is spending a month in residence at the HMSC, collaborating with researchers from various departments on the potential development of a marine drug and biodiscovery unit at Oregon State University.

He is the latest scholar to take part in the Lavern Weber Visiting Scientist Program, which provides opportunities for researchers from other institutions to have an extended stay at the HMSC to work with faculty and students exploring new research questions of mutual interest.

Quest-building workshop

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Looking for a way to connect people with community? Quests are fun clue-directed hunts that get people outdoors exploring the natural, historical and cultural treasures of special places. All it takes is a pencil, a set of directions and a sense of adventure – follow the directions, discover clues and find a hidden Quest box where you can log your success.

The Oregon Coast Quests program, developed by Oregon Sea Grant’s marine education team at the Hatfield Marine Science Center, already has 25 Quests in coastal Lincoln County. Now they’re offering a workshop to teach others how to build their own.

QUEST-BUILDING WORKSHOP
Saturday, February 6, 2010, 1 pm – 4 pm.
OSU Hatfield Marine Science Center, Newport
Registration:$25 /person.

Space is limited to 20 participants, and you need to register by Jan. 29, 2010

The workshops are tailored for teachers, park and museum staffers, local history buffs, naturalists and others interested in using this enjoyable, all-ages adventure format to teach about local human and natural history. Participants will learn about the Quest format and educational philosophy, try out an existing Quest, and build a short practice Quest.

For more information, and a downloadable registration form, visit the Oregon Coast Quests page.

For more information about Oregon Coast Quests or the Quest-building workshop, contact Cait Goodwin at cait.goodwin@oregonstate.edu or 541-961-0968. Tailored workshops and curriculum support are also available.

Public invited to view great white shark dissection today

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Great white shark thaws for necropsy

A 12-foot white shark—popularly known as a great white shark—that died in August after becoming entangled in the ropes of a crab pot, will become the focus of scientists this week during its dissection at Oregon State University’s Hatfield Marine Science Center.

The public is invited to view the necropsy, which will be performed over two days.

“It is a shame that the shark became entangled in the ropes and died, but the specimen still has a great deal of scientific and educational value,” said William Hanshumaker, the OSU center’s marine education specialist, who is coordinating the necropsy. “Top predators such as this are difficult to study and we don’t know a lot about where they migrate or breed.”

Hanshumaker, who also is a faculty member for Sea Grant Extension at OSU, will remove the shark from the freezer today (Thursday, October 1, 2009) and put it on public display in a roped-off section of the HMSC’s Visitor’s Center beginning at 10 a.m. Visitors may observe the shark via video camera in the Hennings Auditorium—including necropsy activities, which begin late this afternoon.

At 4:30 p.m. today, Dr. Brion Benninger, of the Neurological Sciences Institute at Oregon Health & Science University, will remove the shark’s spinal accessory nerve, where it will be used in OHSU neurological studies.

Tomorrow (Friday, October 2) a series of procedures is planned. Wade Smith, a doctoral student at OSU specializing in shark studies, will conduct measurements of the shark beginning at 11 a.m., and discuss his findings with a fishery biology class taught by OSU professor Scott Heppell. At 1 p.m., OSU students from two classes will examine the shark and hear experts present information on shark diversity, the white shark’s biology and movements, its unique features, and conservation issues.

At 2 p.m., Tim Miller-Morgan of OSU will examine the shark for external parasites, and at 2:30 p.m., Hanshumaker will measure the animal’s teeth and bite impression. At 3 p.m., Smith will conclude the dissection by collecting biological materials, the vertebra, muscle tissue, the dorsal fin and teeth—all of which have scientific value.

“There are researchers from throughout the country who are interested in what we’re doing here and have requested sample materials,” Hanshumaker said. “This also is an opportunity for the public to observe first-hand this unique creature and how scientists conduct research and share information.”

Samples from the white shark will be sent to: Stanford’s Hopkins Marine Station; Alaska Department of Fish and Game; University of California-Santa Cruz; California State University-Long Beach; Monterey Bay Aquarium; and Nova Southeastern University.

The samples will provide data for studies ranging from genetics to toxicology, to age and growth data.

(Edited from a news release written by Mark Floyd, OSU News Service, and published online Wednesday, September 30, at democratherald.com)

(photo by Julie Howard, HMSC)

HMSC Visitor Center launches new Web site

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HMSC Visitor Center Web site

HMSC Visitor Center Web site

Planning your next visit to the Central Oregon Coast? Looking for classes you and your children can take to learn more about the ocean and coast? Or maybe you’re just curious about the fascinating creatures that live in the briny deep …

You’ll find all that and more at the brand-new HMSC Visitor Center Web site.

A year in the making, the new site has everything Visitor Center fans might expect – hours of operation, directions, previews of exhibits and programs, a full schedule of Sea Grant marine education programs, classes and camps for kids, families and teachers – and lots more.

You’ll find a new section featuring the popular Oregon Coast Quests adventure activity and a Critter Corner with photos and facts about some of the hundreds of marine animals in our collection. Ask A Scientist gives you a chance to get answers to your questions about the Oregon Coast. And the Fish Health Corner provides a peek behind the scenes at what it takes to keep a world-class aquarium running and its animal residents healthy.

The Visitor Center is managed by Oregon Sea Grant as a central part of the program’s mission to help people understand, rationally use, and conserve marine and coastal resources.

Sea Grant shares in public education grant

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Oregon Sea Grant’s Free-Choice Learning program will join with the Oregon Coast Aquarium, the National Aquarium in Baltimore, the Maryland Science Center and others in a three-year effort to expand professional development opportunities for museum, aquariums, zoo and park educators in an effort to improve informal science education.

The project, known as the Communicating Ocean Sciences Informal Education Network, is funded through a National Science Foundation initiative aimed at fostering and improving the kind of informal science education that takes place at aquariums, museums and other learning centers.

Leading the team for OSU is Shawn Rowe, Sea Grant marine education and learning specialist and an assistant professor with the OSU Department of Science and Math Education. Rowe heads Sea Grant’s Free-Choice Learning program, which studies the kind of learning people do outside the classroom.

Rowe’s program uses the Visitor Center at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport as a living lab for studying various approaches to informal science education, how to engage visitors and what kind of information people take away from their aquarium visits.

The Sea Grant program will receive more than $278,000 from the NSF over the next three years to develop training, workshops and curricula for informal science educators, and to continue work the program has already begun to foster a network of informal science educators and scientists who want to communicate their work to the public.

Read more about Sea Grant’s Free-Choice Learning program here.

Sea Grant, NOAA offer teacher workshop

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NOAA-OEScience teachers in grades 6-12 are invited to take part in the first of a two-part professional development workshop series based on NOAA’s “Learning Ocean Science through Ocean Exploration” curriculum.

The workshop, presented by NOAA and Oregon Sea Grant, will run from 8 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 7, at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport.

This workshop prepares teachers to bring the excitement of current ocean science discoveries to students using the Learning Ocean Science through Ocean Exploration curriculum, CD, and the Ocean Explorer Web site.

The second workshop will be held in spring 2010. Educators who attend both full-day workshops will receive a $100 stipend. Advance registration is required and space is limited. The registration deadline is Oct. 23.

Download registration materials here.