Category: intern-blog

Back in the Penguin exhibit today, and while much of the day’s work mirrored that of Tuesday’s, two very cool things happened. First, Paul Leonard tasked me with feeding the Little Blue penguins. Little Blues, also known as Fairy penguins, are the smallest species of penguins–many visitors to the aquarium mistake them for juveniles–and also happen to be my favorite, so I was very excited to get to work so closely with them. Feeding penguins can be a bit tricky, as you have to put the fish directly into the bird’s mouth before they’ll grab and eat them. This leads to a delicate balancing act, as one must push the fish far enough that they’ll grab on, but not so far that they’ll grab onto one’s fingers. After a few minor bites, I got the hand of things, and managed to get everyone fed and learn to identify a few more birds in the process.
Once feeding was done, everyone jumped straight into cleaning the exhibit, with even more vigor than usual. You see, we’d just found out that morning that Jeff Corwin, of Animal Planet fame, was at the aquarium to shoot a PSA on global warming, and would be in the penguin tank at 11AM sharp to film with the Africans. This didn’t leave us much time to clean up after the morning feed, so we had to work extra hard to get everything looking pristine for the cameras. I had the privilege of staying in the tank while Mr. Corwin was being filmed, and used to opportunity to take some notes on how a nature documentary crew goes about their work. It was great to see Jeff speaking from his heart, rather than using a script, and the penguins sure loved him; Possession, an male African who had taken a shine to following me around the entire tank, climbed up next to Jeff and nuzzled his leg during the entire shoot, while Plum Pudding and In-guza, a breeding pair, took the opportunity to get a bit…intimate right next to him, resulting in a lot of laughs from everyone involved.
After the filming was done, Jeff toured the rest of the tank and then heading off to get some footage with the fur seals, while we all fell back into the same routine; celebrities may come and go, but the animals are always there, and they are always hungry!

Well, the weather almost didn’t permit, but we fortunately were able to dive the Mary Alice B on my last day here in Lake Huron. The morning weather reports, as well as the trees surrounding the Stayer’s house, indicated fairly strong winds that would not die off until the late afternoon–too late to wait for and still have a 24 hour interval before my flight the next day. We decided to take the boat out and judge whether or not the dive was doable once we made it to the wreck, located roughly eight miles northeast of Lexington Harbor. Upon arriving at the dive site, we encountered 1-2 foot rolling swells, which would be no problem whatsoever, if not for the ripping surface current. Jim and Pat Stayer were not planning to dive the wreck, due to some ear issues, so I was to go down again with Deb Dubeck. I got into the water and kicked with all my might to get to the mooring line on the bow, but Deb, who was diving with a set of doubles, could not make it up against so strong a current. It looked like the dive might be canceled after all, but Jim decided to give his ear a try and got suited up (thank goodness all his gear was still on the boat!)
Down we went on the line, unsure of what the conditions would be like when we reached the wreck. The Mary Alice lies in 92ft of water and often visibility is poor; as well, there can be a strong current on the seafloor, much like what I’d experienced diving the Regina. However, as we dropped down deeper and deeper, we found some of the best conditions possible, with no current whatsoever and 50′+ visibility–enough to see clearly from the bow to the stern of the sunken tug resting upright and pristine on the lakebed. The wreck is in such great condition that I was able to enter the wheelhouse, spin the wheel back and forth a couple of times, then go around to the galley, open the door (which peeled open without any resistance) hover over the kitchen sink, perfectly intact. After surfacing into now 2-3′ white-tipped swells, we decided not to attempt a second dive, and instead end the trip on that successful note. That evening, Jim and Pat regaled me with stories of conducting the first ever dive on that wreck–Jim found intact dishes still waiting to be washed in that galley sink–and we headed into town to film (and enjoy) the local fireworks display. All in all, a great end to a great trip, and another successful stage completed on this amazing internship. Next up–working with penguins and diving with sharks at the New England Aquarium!

Storm clouds threatened as we headed out to sea lake on the morning of my fourth day in Michigan, so we quickly adjusted our destination; instead of diving the Price, the first dive of the day would be the Regina. Both ships were large freighters that sank during a fierce storm in 1913; the Regina (250′ long) settled upside-down in 77′ of water. Though the lake surface was smooth as glass when we arrived at our mooring on the bow, we found a decent current moving towards the stern when we hit bottom. Unfortunately, Pat’s regulator started free-flowing from the primary stage as soon as we hit the upturned keel, but after getting her back to the surface I was able to complete the dive with the Stayers’ good friend Deb Dudeck; despite not having dove the Regina in a number of years, she proved to be quite the capable guide, helping me find crates of cargo, portholes, and the ship’s name, still legible on the bow.  We had intended our second dive to be on the stern of the ship, but the buoy was missing and the current too strong for us to free-descend; instead, we headed back to the Sport to get some more footage (this time, with the proper weights!) Tomorrow–weather permitting–we’ll dive one of the most intact wrecks in Lake Huron, the Mary Alice B. (discovered by none other than Jim and Pat Stayer!)

The storm finally left us overnight, and Jim and Pat Stayer were quick to jump on the opportunity to get some wreck dives in. We loaded up gear into their boat–including cameras to film both topside and underwater–and sped off to the first dive of the day, a 56′ tugboat named the Sport. This boat is famous for being the first tug built with steel to cruise the Great Lakes; despite sinking in 1920 she remains in excellent condition, with an intact hull and easily visible boiler, prop, and steering wheel. The first thing I noticed when descending the Sport, however, was how quickly I sank to the bottom; turns out I’d forgotten to adjust my weights for freshwater diving, and was a good 5 lbs heavy. This caused some buoyancy issues while filming, but I still managed to get some great footage of the wreck and the countless gobies swarming over it.
After diving the Sport, we heading back inshore to dive a shallow wreck located less than a mile off the harbor–the Eliza Strong. This 200′ wreck is in a bit more disrepair than the Sport; it seems that, not too long after sinking 1901, the Army Corp of Engineers decided to “flatten” the Strong with over half a ton of dynamite so that there would be at least 20′ of clearance over the ship. What remains are long lengths of deck boards, lots of scrap metal (including a number of large, hand-forged nails,) and countless fish seeking refuge in the scattered ruins. This time, with my weight corrected, I glided effortlessly around the wreck, capturing good footage of the debris (despite the runoff from the recent storm, visibility was at least 25′) and even discovering a sizable channel catfish hidden among the planks. On both dives, my new DUI drysuit continued to do its job perfectly; despite the water temperature being a good 30 degrees lower than Panama, I never felt cold at all.

After a weekend’s respite, I returned to the action again, this time at Lake Huron, where a surprisingly tenacious storm has blown out our chances to dive for the past two days. Fortunately, the extra time on land allowed me to catch up on logging and capturing all the footage I took in Panama. Pat and Jim Stayer, my gracious hosts (and excellent cinematographers) gave a number of tips for recording and managing all the footage I’m accumulating this summer, as well as some invaluable tips for underwater color correction (though the Sony HC3 captures beautiful detail in hi-def video, it’s auto-white balance leaves something to be desired.) My editing workload will be a lot more manageable–and less stressful!–thanks to their input and advice. And it couldn’t come at a better time, as the next few days promise to rack up the footage as the three of us head out to film some freshwater wrecks.

Another deep dive today, to 120′ this time. Now that we had been exposed to some of the challenges of deep diving, we were given a more specific assignment, to document distribution of various marine species at depth. This time around, everyone was prepared for narcosis at depth, no matter how subtle, and as a result our dive went a lot smoother. Even though two divers experienced significant, noticeable narcosis, everyone performed their checks properly and recorded usable data at depth; the only “victim” was one diver who, lured by Terrence gesturing at something at the seafloor, hit 128′ before she realized what he was up to. But for that, the dive went quite smoothly, and we were rewarded with the spotting of a large hogfish at 110′–the first decent sized game fish we’ve seen this trip–as well as a pair of squid hovering over the reef at 30′ that pulsed various shades of blue as we drifted by.
The rest of the day was spent relaxing onshore, but as the sun started to set we cast off again, heading back towards Portobelo Harbor for a night dive at the San Marinas reef. Though lighting difficulties limited the quality of the footage I could capture on that dive, it was still very enjoyable to cruise around the reef wall at 60′, observing the bioluminescence, various crustaceans, and (finally) a definite glimpse of an adult octopus, who was unfortuantely securely buried in a rock face so that only his tentacles protruded out in sight.
Tomorrow will bring us our final dive, which promises to test our experience and take us to the recreational depth limit of 130′. These past few dives have been a great capstone to all the learning and fun we’ve had on this trip; Panama will sorely be missed, though I can’t wait to see what’s next to come in this incredible internship.

On Friday, we hopped in the boat at 0900 to take a half-hour ride to a freighter sunk about a mile off the Panama Canal entrance. This roughly 150′-long cargo ship was intentionally sunk in the mid 1970s, and we wanted to observe how much coral growth and fish activity the wreck contained now, 30 years later. That close to the canal entrance, we weren’t expecting good visibility, but were pleasantly surprised when we broke through a murky halocline at 15′ and could clearly see the wreck, located 45′ below. For a fairly recent wreck, the freighter had considerable coral growth, especially on the sheltered stern side, where we spotted a few sea cucumbers and starfish. On the exposed top deck, multiple schools of fish flitted around, including a group of docile spadefish that let us drift next to them, just inches away, without flinching. One of the most impressive finds on the dive was a large blue tang, measuring about ten inches in length, that darted in and out of the exposed substructure and we coasted overhead. Overall, a great wreck; unfortunately I, assuming the worst for visibility, neglected to bring the Gates housing–make that one more lesson learned: always bring the videocamera!

Today was the day we’d been planning quite some time for, the day we’d make a dive past the century mark! I know some of the readers of this blog will yawn at that number, but for myself and most of the divers on this trip, who are not deco-trained, any opportunity to further our training at depth is eagerly anticipated. The dive plan was laid out thoroughly, and Dr. Illife and Terrence gave everyone a few simple tasks to do at depth; they also cautioned us on the effects of nitrogen narcosis as depth increases, but all the students seemed to think, “We’ve felt fine at 90+ feet, how much worse could that extra ten feet be?” (I bet you can see where this is going…) Well, we did the dive, spent ten minutes at 110′, and then carefully rode our no-decomp limits as we gradually ascended the reef. Back on the boat, I was chagrined to hear of a multitude of minor problems that had occurred at the bottom–people forgetting to do some of the tasks, (which only involved giving our safety divers a time check at 5 minutes, a PSI check at 8, and then a “one minute until ascend” warning at 9 minutes,) or losing track of time, or even unintentionally breaking the strict 110′ depth limit we had set, and almost running into deco! I personally had felt no symptoms of narcosis, and had no problem completing the tasks mentioned above, but quite a few people appeared to have been hit in some small way. Terrence revealed that that was the point of this dive, and the tasks he and Dr. Illife had assigned; nitrogen narcosis does not necessarily manifest itself in obvious ways, but even at just past 100 feet it can have a considerable effect on a diver’s ability to function properly. I was glad to have passed the test, as it were; that dive was certainly an eye opener, and a reminder of the caution and alertness all divers must display whenever diving the limits of recreational scuba (and beyond.)

…But not all of today was about somber lessons! After lunch, while some of the group finished a rocky shoreline survey for the last research project, myself, Dr. Illife, and four other students went on a rain forest hike. We started on a sizable dirt trail, fording numerous streams as we viewed the wide variety of flora, but after about an hour the trail ended in a thicket of date palms, and we decided to bushwhack ahead and try to summit the large hill, or loma, that we’d already started to climb. The next half hour was a grueling experience, as we braved mud, entangling vines, spiky trees, and ants the size of my thumb (only slightly exaggerating,) but in the end it was worth it, for we made it to the top and had a stunning vista of Portobelo Harbor, Drake Island, and the Caribbean sea stretching out in front of us. The path down was just as challenging as going up–at times we had to use nearby vines as ropes and essentially rappel down the steeper portions of the loma–but the grins evident on our mud soaked faces when we returned to the trail made it clear that we had had quite the adventure. On the way back, we encountered a truck that had skidded off the trail, a group of young Panamanians splashing in a pool that, judging from their startled looks, mistook us for Los Diablos Blancos, and a passing flock of chickens, but we still made it back just in time for dinner! …Though we did have to clean up a bit, first.

The halfway point of this trip found our group hard at work on a number of research projects. On Monday, we took a day off from diving; the morning was spent on a flat-bottomed boat, touring a series of mangrove swamps to collect data on the organisms found in such an environment. Besides the numerous crabs that scuttled up prop roots, across tree branches, and (occasionally) all over our boat, we spotted kingfishers, giant termites nests, scarlet ibises, green- and blue herons, squirrel cuckoos, and a two-toed sloth (who was moving far faster than one would normally expect a sloth to.)
That afternoon, we returned to the shallow bay we had explored on the 11th, in order to conduct some quadrant surveys on the large sea grass beds found there. Yours truly spotted a pair of small squid hiding among a fallen branch, and then discovered why it is a good idea to wear a weight belt when filming underwater, even if just snorkeling in swim trunks: I had to grab a rock about half the size of my head in order to sink down far enough to get a decent shot of the cephalopods.
We had originally planned a deep dive to 110′ for Tuesday morning, but had to switch plans when Terrence had to make an impromptu trip to Panama City that wouldn’t bring him back until later that afternoon. We delayed that dive until Wednesday, and instead revisited two sites near Drakes Island. At the first site, a large and and (apparently) curious Queen Angelfish followed us around the reef for the majority of the dive, while during the afternoon trip I got some excellent footage of a school of tangs and parrotfish grazing the algae off of a large brain coral specimen. That evening, I took the Gates housing to film some coral transects that we had set up just offshore from the hotel, and discovered another important thing to check for when shooting: make sure there is enough tape left! Fortunately, I got the footage I needed with not a second left to spare, and was able to unwind afterwards, playing guitar with some of the locals and learning a couple of new songs.