ODFW Adventures: Part III

To begin to describe my week, I will start by sharing my progress on my non-work-related goal for the summer, which was to learn how to cook. And not just make dinner from a package, but to create authentic meals that I usually find myself going to restaurants to satisfy my cravings. So this week I decided to take my cooking a step further–I cooked something I have never made before, Dahl. This Indian dish of lentils, vegetables, and spices may have taken me nearly two hours to make in our tiny kitchen, but my efforts were a success! Especially when it was served with rice, curried chicken, and naan! I hope to update everyone next week with another new dish!

At ODFW, the most exciting thing I accomplished was counting my very last sample on Friday afternoon, meaning no more bending over a microscope, no more clicking, and no more sore neck muscles! My patience and persistence has finally paid off! All in all, I counted 21 samples and 442 sub-samples that weighed 1-2 grams. It was a long process, but now that I’m finished counting I can use my online GIS training by applying it to this project! Although I still find GIS software to be quite complicated, the online course I took last week was extremely helpful and walked me step by step of how to make different “layers” of a map, using Yellowstone as the example. I learned how to create layers of trails, temperatures, precipitation levels, ranger districts, and other wonderful layers and features you can add to a map with this software. For my project I will be mapping the distribution and abundance of the herring eggs throughout the Yaquina Bay. The abundance that will be calculated with this map will then allow me to predict how many herring will be in the bay next season, and the fishing quota will be set at 20% of the predicted abundance. I am very excited to start the second half of this project in the coming week! 

On the Nearshore Strategy side, I spent the week finding sources to use for the supplemental climate change document my team will be writing. Once I found the articles my team suggested, I organized them into folders based on their emphasis on habitat (for the purposes of the Nearshore Strategy, rocky shore, sandy beach, rocky subtidal, soft-bottom subtidal, and open water) and/or impact type (changes in sea surface temperature, sea level rise, upwelling, hypoxia, storm intensity/erosion and wave height, ocean currents, interannual and interdecadal cycles, ocean acidification, and freshwater inputs). I have learned that although the ocean currently is and will experience many of these different impact types, many articles written by climate scientists and oceanographers focus on temperature changes. Finding this in my research frustrated me because I believe that the complex systems and processes of the ocean are effected by many different impact types, each of which is just as important as the last. Yet I am excited to read the articles in depth and search for more articles to learn more about how climate change will affect the ocean off of the Oregon coast. With these articles I will be creating an annotated bibliography for the climate change document this week that will likely become an appendix to the document. To prepare for this task, I had some practice making a reference sheet this week when I cited the articles Ali used in the overall strategy update. Although it was a great review of how to cite scientific articles, I learned that not all articles (especially when they are found on the internet) are easy or even possible to cite. So I figured out how to cite articles and sources with whatever information is available–I am now a citation master! With this useful skill set, I will be spending next week in the library if anyone needs to find me!