As I wrote in my last blog post, I am in the process of studying for my preliminary exams that will happen in late March (written exams) and late April (oral exam).
My committee members provided me with reading lists of material they thought was important for me to know in order for me to become a PhD candidate. This will serve as the basis for my dissertation research, and provides the framework for how my contribution will advance the field. In the last month, I have been reading many, many articles, book chapters, theses, etc. to build this foundation.
One of the first steps was to organize all of the readings for my prelims on a big board that would help me visualize what has been done and what is still missing for each of the committee members
The material I am reading is a mixture of foundational and novel material, which are equally important. Foundational articles tell us about the origin of a specific field or theme, and help me to understand fundamental concepts and theories. It is really interesting to see what the pioneer researchers in the field first thought and how they tested their hypotheses many years ago. It is also remarkable to read novel papers and see how these foundational ideas have evolved and developed into new hypotheses, leading to new studies and experiments which push the boundaries of what we already know.
Review papers can also give a sense of this timeline by compiling studies on a particular topic. By assembling all of the available findings in my field, it becomes clear what questions remain unanswered, justifying the goals of my research, and establishing the project’s theoretical and methodological framework.
In my PhD project we are attempting to address some of the unanswered questions related to stress responses in baleen whales. Reading about other studies, their results, and the diverse techniques that have been applied to other taxa makes me really excited about what I can still incorporate in the project.
At the end of my PhD, if we are able to answer our proposed questions, we will have contributed to advancing the field of knowledge, and we will be able to apply our results to the conservation and management of baleen whales in nearshore coastal ecosystems.
The more I read the content proposed by my committee members, the more I find connections between my PhD project, its aims, and the title I proposed for myself as being a “Conservation Physiologist”. Being a Conservation Physiologist is exactly what I want to be, during my PhD, and in the future.
By Rachael Orben PhD., Research Associate in the Seabird Oceanography Lab and GEMM Lab
So, there is something called work-life balance. I am still trying to find mine.
As an undergraduate it was easy. I sailed a lot and my grades suffered. In hindsight that was the best choice I could have made. I learned to sail, spent time on the water and in the end, I think I turned out ok. Following that I spent ~7 years working as a field technician in remote, stunningly beautiful places, with lots of seabirds. I would sum these years up as having very little life balance with lots of experience.
From there I started grad school. At age 29, I relearned how to live in a town and bought my first car. I spent 5.5 years in grad school, but 14 months of this time were spent in the field (not all for my PhD research). During the last phase of my PhD I was often too mentally exhausted on the weekends to even consider trying to write or to analyze data. I tracked my working hours with RescueTime and I found that after a weekend at play my Monday at work was often very focused and productive. Then through the week my productivity would drop.
That seemed promising. Playing more equaled more efficient work hours. The tales are true.
And then I started post doc life. A new town, more rain, and more projects that come with deadlines. For the most part, my attempts for a work-life balance went out the window as I adjusted to the new locale. I still do field work and within that experience I can catch my academic breath – while working just as hard.
Evening on High Bluffs, St. George AK
One can read ad nauseam about struggles academic scientists have balancing work and life. There is lots of sage advice out there (e.g. here) and dismay with a system that asks so much of a person (here). As I continue on this career path I know that demands on my time will only become more and more frequent. There is a part of me that likes the idea of curling up on a rainy Saturday morning and crunching out some data analysis even though in the long run this probably isn’t a good approach. And maybe that is the problem – I love most of what I do!
For now, I am still learning. What do I focus on? What do I spend my time on? How do I meet deadlines without a dose of panic? How do I restrain my growing to-do list?
**In order to make sure that I didn’t over or under achieve on this blog post I asked the internet ‘how long should a blog post be?’ It turns out the answers are varied. But somewhere between 700 and 1,600 words is a good target. I made it to 488. Today there is a dog that wants a walk, a talk to be written, a manuscript to revise, dinner to cook…
Last week, I attended the Seattle Garden Show with my mom and a friend of hers. We particularly enjoyed the West Seattle Nursery’s entry that was intended to reflect on the idea that “Nothing Lasts, Nothing is Perfect, and Nothing is Finished.” My mom and her friend proceeded to articulate a feeling I think many of us have struggled with. Not quite “imposter syndrome” because the feeling is not limited to your job, it pervades the whole human experience. Rather, we talked about the idea that as a child, you have an impression that adults have everything figured out in life, but as you grow older, you realize that everyone is just muddling along as best they can. The most important take-away for me in listening to two late-middle-age women have this conversation was: the feeling of being unprepared never goes away, but you have to tackle life head on anyways.
When I finally finished my master’s degree, a similar feeling of ‘what do I do now?!’ caught me by surprise. I was fully cognizant of all the hard work I had done, but my mentally and emotionally exhausted brain could no longer compute how this accomplishment translated to real world skills. I could no longer see the whole of my work, I could only stress out about the bits that I felt were weak or could have been done better. I was lost in that insidious trap of thinking that because I felt like I still had so much to learn, that my peers had their lives and their research figured out so much more effectively than my own. Time and distance, counseling, and listening to many conversations like my mom’s, helped me to break away from this trap and remember that “Nothing Lasts [Grad school took 3 years], Nothing is Perfect [My work does not need to be perfect in order to matter], and Nothing is Finished [I will never be done learning]”.
Before I moved away from the lab, I was asked to compile my institutional knowledge into a “How to” guide for new GEMM Lab members. It really does cover a wide range of topics. There are tips about computer log-ons, where to find certain administrative paperwork and when to fill it out, how to make a post on this blog, protocols for photo-ID work and other routine lab tasks, and even some favorite recipes for lab meetings. Setting this guide up was another helpful step on my journey to remember how much I have learned in the last 3 years, and how much I am capable of contributing to a group.
Team Ro-buff-stus in August 2017.Team Ro-buff-stus in 2016Our team name is derived from the scientific name of the gray whale: E. robustus, and the colorful “buff” scarves you can see us wearing on most days. 2015
I’m now actively job hunting, and while this has been stressful, it has also been strangely encouraging as I reframe the variety of skills I picked up in grad school and realize just how much is hidden in that new line on my resume. There are so many common application bullet points that I can answer with confidence. Yes! I have teaching and leadership experience because I trained and supervised 3 generations of interns in the gray whale foraging ecology project. Yes! I have data processing and analysis experience through my classwork and my successfully defended thesis. Yes! I have scientific writing experience – one of my thesis chapters has been accepted for publication in theJournal of Wildlife Management. With every Yes! my confidence grows, and I get more excited to start the newest chapter in my life. I recognize that many of my applications will be rejected, because there are many other qualified applicants out there, but I will keep trying, because Nothing lasts [The job search is temporary], Nothing is Perfect [I do not need to be perfect to get the job], and Nothing is Finished [There will always be room for me to grow].
Moving Day! The GEMM Lab helps Kelly and Florence pack their house.
I am incredibly thankful to everyone who supported my journey. My advisor Leigh, has been a fabulous mentor in the best sense of the word from day one. My lab mates Amanda, Rachael, Dawn, Solene, Leila, Erin, Alexa, and Dom have been excellent confidantes, cheerleaders, and sources of inspiration. My husband, Kelly made sure that I always had a cup of tea, a warm meal, and a hug to keep me going. My interns, Sarah, Cricket, Justin, Kelli, Catherine, Cathryn, Maggie, Nathan and Quince made my field work both possible and enjoyable. My family and friends at home kept me grounded even at a distance, and my Corvallis contra dancing community reminds me to dance my cares away, because nothing lasts, nothing is perfect, and nothing is finished.
By Dawn Barlow, MSc student, Department of Fisheries and Wildlife
A few weeks ago, my labmate Dom’s blog reminded me that it is important to step back from the data and appreciate the magnificence of the animals we study from time to time. I have the privilege of studying the largest creatures on the planet. When people hear that I study blue whales, I often get a series of questions: Just how big are they, really? How many are there? Where do they migrate? Where do they breed? Despite the fact that humans hunted blue whales nearly to extinction [1,2], we still know next to nothing about these giants. The short answer to many of those questions is, “Well we don’t really know, but we’re working on it!” Which brings me back to taking time to marvel at these animals for a bit. Isn’t it remarkable that the largest animals on earth can be so mysterious?
A blue whale comes up for air in a calm sea. Photo by Leigh Torres.
Last year at this time we were aboard a research vessel in New Zealand surveying for blue whales and collecting a myriad of biological data to try and glean some insight into their lives. This winter I am processing those data and conducting a literature review to get a firm grasp on what others have found before about blue whale foraging and bioenergetics. On any given Tuesday morning Leigh and I can be found musing about the mechanics of a baleen whale jaw, about what oceanographic boundaries in the water column might be meaningful to a blue whale, about how we might quantify the energy expenditure of a foraging whale. Here are some of those musings.
Approaching a blue whale in a rigid-hull inflatable boat for data collection. UAS piloted by Todd Chandler.
Humans are, for the most part, terrestrial creatures. Even those of us that would prefer to spend most of our time near, on, or in the water are limited in what we can observe of marine life. Much of the early data that was collected on blue whales came from whaling catches. Observations of anatomy and morphology were made once the whales were killed and taken out of their marine environment. This was not long ago—Soviet whaling continued into the 1970’s in New Zealand [3]. Because baleen whales are long lived (exact age unknown for blue whales but a bowhead whale was estimated to be at least 150 years old [4]) it is entirely possible that blue whales living today remember being hunted by whalers. Observing whales in their natural state is not easy, particularly post-commercial whaling when they are few and far between.
Yet, where there is a challenge, clever people develop creative approaches and new technologies, leading to new insights. High-quality cameras have allowed scientists to photograph whales for individual identification—a valuable first step in figuring out how many there are and where they go [5]. Satellite tags have allowed scientists to track the movement of blue whales in the North Pacific and Indian Oceans, a first step in learning where these whales might go to breed. However, no blue whale breeding ground has definitively been discovered yet…
What does a whale do when it is below the surface, out of sight of our terrestrial eyes? A study from 1986 that attempted to calculate the prey demands of a whale assumed that whenever a whale was submerged, it was feeding [6]. A big assumption, but a starting place without any dive data. By 2002, tags equipped with time-depth recorders (TDR) had already revealed that blue whales make dives of variable depths and shapes [7]. But, what determines a whale’s path underwater, where they must conserve as much oxygen as they can while finding and exploiting patches of prey? The advent of digital acoustic recording tags (DTAGs) in the early 2000s have allowed scientists to measure the fine-scale movements of whales in three dimensions [8]. These tags can capture the kinematic signatures (based on pitch, roll, and yaw) of lunge-feeding events below the surface. And with the addition of echosounder technology that allows us to map the prey field, we can now link feeding events with characteristics of the prey present in the area [9]. With this progression of technology, curiosity and insight we now know that blue whales are not indiscriminate grazers, but instead pass up small patches of krill in favor of large, dense aggregations where they will get the most energetic bang for their buck.
A blue whale shows its fluke as it dives deep in an area with abundant krill deep in the water column. Photo by L. Torres.
The advent of unmanned aerial systems (UAS, a.k.a. “drones”) have provided yet another unique perspective on the lives of these whales. In 2016, our New Zealand blue whale team recorded nursing behavior between a mother and calf. In 2017, we were able to capture surface lunge feeding behavior from an aerial perspective, both for the first time.
A blue whale lunges on an aggregation of krill. UAS piloted by Todd Chandler.
Through innovative approaches, we are beginning to understand the lives of these mysterious giants. As is true for many things, the more we learn, the more questions we have. Through the GEMM Lab’s blue whale project, we have determined that a unique population of blue whales occupies the South Taranaki Bight region of New Zealand year-round; they do not simply migrate through as their current threat classification status indicates [10]. But what are their distribution patterns? Can we predict when and where whales are most likely to be in the South Taranaki Bight? Does this population have a different foraging strategy than their Californian, Chilean, or Antarctic counterparts? These are the things we are working on unraveling, and that will aid in their conservation. In the meantime, I’ll keep musing about what we don’t know, and remember to keep marveling at what we do know about the largest creatures on earth.
A blue whale mother and calf surface near Farewell Spit, New Zealand. Photo by D. Barlow.
References:
Clapham, P. J., Young, S. B. & Brownell Jr., R. L. Baleen whales: conservation issues and the status of the most endangered populations. Mamm. Rev.29, 37–60 (1999).
Branch, T. a, Matsuoka, K. & Miyashita, T. Evidence for increases in Antarctic blue whales based on baysian modelling. Mar. Mammal Sci.20, 726–754 (2004).
Branch, T. A. et al. Past and present distribution, densities and movements of blue whales Balaenoptera musculus in the Southern Hemisphere and northern Indian Ocean. Mammal Review37, 116–175 (2007).
George, J. C. et al. Age and growth estimates of bowhead whales (Balaena mysticetus) via aspartic acid racemization. Can. J. Zool.77, 571–580 (1998).
Sears, R. et al. Photographic identification of the Blue Whale (Balaenoptera musculus) in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Canada. Report of the International Whaling Commission Special Issue 335–342 (1990).
Kenney, R. D., Hyman, M. A. M., Owen, R. E., Scott, G. P. & Winn, H. E. Estimation of prey densities required by Western North Atlantic right whales. Mar. Mammal Sci.2, 1–13 (1986).
Acevedo-Gutierrez, A., Croll, D. A. & Tershy, B. R. High feeding costs limit dive time in the largest whales. J. Exp. Biol.205, 1747–1753 (2002).
Johnson, M. P. & Tyack, P. L. A digital acoustic recording tag for measuring the response of wild marine mammals to sound. IEEE J. Ocean. Eng.28, 3–12 (2003).
Hazen, E. L., Friedlaender, A. S. & Goldbogen, J. A. Blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus) optimize foraging efficiency by balancing oxygen use and energy gain as a function of prey density. Sci. Adv.1, e1500469–e1500469 (2015).
Baker, C. S. et al.Conservation status of New Zealand marine mammals, 2013. (2016).
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