currenttidings2023-1
Current Tidings
Shannon Point Marine Center
Volume 2023, Issue 1
The winter quarter has seen a lot of activity at SPMC with much of that centered on diving and boating. In addition to a busy schedule of trips for our vessels and captains, we are continuing our scientific diving certification program (described in this newsletter) for participants from the Sea Discovery Center, the Samish Indian Nation, and the WWU Marine and Coastal Science program. We also provided a Motorboat Operator Training Course for staff from the WA State Department of Ecology including the Padilla Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve and the Washington Conservation Corps. These pilot trainings are an important step toward a model that will allow us to regularly offer these certifications to WWU faculty, staff, and students. With our outstanding facilities and equipment, and our uniquely qualified staff, SPMC is in an excellent position to not only support research and coursework, but to also provide these valuable professional development opportunities. We are grateful to the members of our SPMC team who support these on-the-water and in-the-water activities.
Building Inclusivity and Experience
Photo Credit: Calvin Abbott
Shannon Point’s long-time snorkeling and scientific diving programs are getting an upgrade! Led by WWU Diving Safety Officer Nate Schwarck and energized by new Shannon Point Laboratory Manager Derek Smith, a test run of a dive training course is being held this winter and spring for folks from WWU and collaborating organizations. The course aims to train participants with skills they need in the near-term (research projects, monitoring, work on underwater structures) and to provide them with certification for future study and employment opportunities.
Nate Schwarck works with Marine and Coastal Sciences undergraduates Gabi Vitale and Abi Lee to learn SCUBA basics at the Anacortes pool.
The course combines academic content with in-water experiences. As past president of the American Academy for Underwater Sciences (AAUS), Derek and others in that community built an e-training course (motivated by the pandemic) that is the starting point for Shannon Point course participants - a knowledge “pre-load”, as Derek describes it. The course proper involves weekly virtual meetings (to accommodate the geographic spread of participants) and in-water training that starts in the Anacortes town pool. Students progress through various pools, lakes, and finally marine locations such as Poulsbo and Keystone. With successful completion they’ll receive AAUS certifications in Scientific Diving - these are becoming widely recognized through a growing national registry.
Dr. Kathryn Sobocinski and students use the new cold-water snorkeling gear off the Shannon Point beach.
Folks participating in the current course are from WWU, Padilla Bay Estuarine Research Reserve, the Puget Sound Restoration Fund, the Samish Indian Nation, and the Poulsbo Sea Discovery Center. The hope is to grow this into a formal class that can be offered for WWU academic credit, perhaps every winter quarter.
This new course dovetails nicely with recent equipment and facilities upgrades. The dive locker at Shannon Point has recently been re-organized and refurbished, in part to make room for new gear. A recent $6,250 grant from local refinery HF Sinclair paid for 10 semi-dry suits along with snorkeling gear; this can outfit a small group of students for cold-water snorkeling in the stunning underwater seascapes of the Salish Sea. The longer-term vision is to double this snorkeling capacity and to add SCUBA gear, including buoyancy compensators and regulators. A major barrier to SCUBA certification is the cost of gear and training. This entire effort is in service of Shannon Point’s long-term priority of making marine science more accessible and inclusive. Thanks to all who are making this exciting program a reality!
Tanika Ladd: Jumping into new experiences
Post-doctoral associate Tanika Ladd has taken the plunge into a dazzling array of new experiences and projects since starting at Shannon Point in Fall of 2021. With a PhD from UC Santa Barbara in phytoplankton physiology and ecology, she’s now exploring the world of deep-sea dives, studying the intersection between larval and microbial ecology. New experiences abound: her longest cruise ever (50 days!), first submersible dives, first research collaborations with ocean engineers - as Tanika reports, she’s “jumping into a whole new thing!”
Tanika’s post-doctoral research asks how biofilms influence larval settlement near hydrothermal vents. A team of investigators is characterizing the films and associated larvae and animal colonists, formed on plates set out during a previous cruises to the East Pacific Rise vent fields. Tanika is using statistical techniques to model larval settlement based on biofilm metagenomes and proteomes, asking “What are the attributes that best predict larval settlement?” Just finding the plates turned out to be hard - crabs throw them around, animals cover them, and of course this is all done with the robot arms and claws of deep submersible Alvin at ~2500 m depth!
Tanika has also gotten funding from WWU’s Research and Sponsored Programs office for a pilot project to look at zooplankton diets in these vent fields. She’ll use DNA barcoding to look at the copepod microbiome and compare that to the microbial community in surrounding waters. After getting her methods up and running she’ll be able to ask questions about zooplankton diet selectivity, and hopefully place these consumers in the context of the deep-sea microbial food web.
With all of this exciting activity, plus cruise delays due to equipment breakdowns, Tanika’s post-doc has been extended into a third year. The field of deep-sea ecology has clearly made a convert - Tanika reports that the sense of exploration is much like that of astronomy, which she studied as an undergraduate. She loves working with a close community in such a remote environment. Along with the hiking, kayaking and camping she and her husband enjoy in the area, it seems this corner of the Pacific Northwest is as rewarding for Tanika as her presence is for the Shannon Point community!
Jeremy Johnson: Inspired by Phytoplankton
Biology graduate student Jeremy Johnson’s future just keeps unrolling in front of him. Growing up in the rural town of North Bend, Washington, as a first-generation college student, he describes WWU as his “only choice” and states that his undergraduate degree there was going to be the end of his academic journey. Inspired by his Marine Ecology class with Dr. Arellano, however, he joined the Masters program (where he’s in his second year) and now has his eye on a doctorate!
Jeremy is a self-proclaimed phytoplankton lover, and his research with Drs. Brady Olson and Karin Lemkau centers on polyunsaturated aldehydes. These potential diatom defense compounds, affectionately known as ‘PUAs’, can reduce reproduction rates in some predators. Jeremy is studying PUAs in benthic diatoms, including their response to carbon dioxide levels in seawater. Challenges he’s faced are many: isolating the benthic diatoms from local waters (they tend to be ‘covered in snot’), spinning up the chemistry of PUA analysis in conjunction with Dr. Lemkau and Ian Parker (Chemistry undergrad), and running culture experiments under simulated upwelling conditions. Whew!
Chromatogram showing peaks associated with 3 different PUAs (upper boxes) from a benthic diatom assemblage.
Jeremy has so far found eight (beautiful!) benthic diatom PUA producers in the Salish Sea. In microcosm experiments run at Shannon Point’s Ocean Acidification facility last fall, he found similar rates of inorganic carbon drawdown and PUA production regardless of treatment pCO2 level. So far the benthic isolates show lower PUA production levels than planktonic diatoms, tempting one (well, this author, anyway) to speculate that the benthic species have other defenses to deter predation. Jeremy gives a special shout-out here to Shannon Point lab technician Horng-Yuh Lee for all of her help with inorganic carbon sample and data analysis, stating “I couldn’t have done it without her!”
Jeremy in the chemistry lab at Shannon Point (left) and an example of Jeremy's ceramic work (right).
When he’s not wrestling with science challenges or admiring the beauty of diatoms, Jeremy throws pots as a member of the WWU Ceramics Club (another point of connection with Lee, who is a gifted ceramicist). He enjoys making things that are functional and useable. As a teaching assistant for Biology 206 (Introduction to Organismal Biology), he loves connecting daily with students, trying to communicate science in a way that is “not boring”. Jeremy’s spirited energy and dedication have brought him far already - we can’t wait to see what his future has in store!
Nate Schwarck: Monitoring the Strait (and beyond!)
A monthly sampling effort that started out with a day trip to three nearby oceanographic stations has grown into a multi-day effort that encompasses much of the central Salish Sea. I caught up with Shannon Point Captain Nate Schwarck recently to find out what this JEMS program is all about.
The Joint Effort to Monitor the Strait (JEMS) was the label applied some years ago to the program sampling three oceanographic stations in the eastern Straits of Juan de Fuca. Shannon Point took over the task of supporting this sampling from Friday Harbor Laboratories in ; our fast boat and able crew were an efficient solution for the Washington State Department of Ecology (DOE), the main supporter of this effort. So efficient, in fact, that Shannon Point now supports the sampling of several dozen stations located around Whidbey, the San Juan Islands, and elsewhere in northern Puget Sound. These stations used to be accessed from a seaplane. Captain Nate spends either two very long days or, more typically, three days per month traveling to these stations with DOE personnel who bring their own CTD (a sampling device that measures temperature, salinity, dissolved oxygen, and other properties as it descends through the water column). Current DOE personnel include Natalie Coleman, a former WWU graduate student who was advised by Dr. Brian Bingham. The small world effect!
DOE monitoring stations sampled by Shannon Point boats and personnel shown in pink; other monitoring stations shown in blue.
Data collected at these stations are used to understand changes in the Salish Sea ecosystem, both short- and long-term. One place the data end up are in DOE’s monthly Eyes Over Puget Sound reports that describe the “State of the Sound”. These are informative and beautifully produced - you can find and subscribe to them here.
When asked about a ‘most memorable experience’ on these sampling trips, Nate recalled a close encounter of the military kind. He was working on the west side of Whidbey Island with the CTD down at about 60 meters depth when a zodiac with blue flashing lights, manned by guys with rifles, pulled up announcing “You must vacate the area!” They were escorted out of the way as a submarine surfaced just where they had been parked. And then there is dodging the container ships . . . some of the original JEMS stations are right in the middle of the shipping lanes . . . and of course there is weather, necessitating frequent rescheduling in the stormy season, and a nimble approach to logistics.
DOE personnel collect water samples aboard Shannon Point’s vessel Magister on a benign weather day.
Why does Shannon Point, a university program and facility, support sampling by the DOE? In short, the effort brings in dollars that subsidize the operation and maintenance of the boat R.V. Magister for other (less lucrative) operations such as use by WWU classes. Nate also points out that WWU students are welcome to join these trips, to gain experience or to collect samples of their own, as long as the latter do not add time to the operation. Two graduate students just joined the February trip to produce outreach content for research on plankton, thereby killing three birds (monitoring, student experience, outreach) with one stone!
New Gear: A $6,250 HF Sinclair Social Investment grant, “Safe snorkeling for marine research and education”, was awarded to Shannon Point for cold-water snorkel gear. This includes 12 sets of masks, fins, and snorkels as well as gloves, booties, and semi-drysuits with attached hoods. A big ‘thank you’ goes to Nate Schwarck for overseeing the purchase of this gear. The goal is to be able to take all the REU students or a small course out at a low tide. Given the cost of in-water research and education, this is another solid step forward for inclusivity in Marine Science!
Facility Improvements: The last few months have seen numerous changes and upgrades to the Shannon Point buildings and campus, including: Boat ramp removal and beach regrade on the Shannon Point beach; Installation of gutter guards on most buildings; Renovation of the old pump house to provide a quarantine facility for invasive/toxic marine organisms; Dive locker upgrade; Installation of an entrance gate.
Special thanks to Scott Maystadt and Derek Smith for all of their energies throughout these upgrades!
Arellano Lab: Most of the Arellano group participated in an epic 50-day cruise to the East Pacific Rise, necessitating their absence through the holiday period. Three members of the lab - Vanessa Jimenez (MS student), Wyatt Heimbichner Goebel (MS student), and Tanika Ladd (Post Doc) all got their first Alvin dives! It was Shawn's first cruise as chief scientist, and she made sure every scientist on board received an Alvin dive. Remarkably, on this cruise Dexter Davis marked his 100th day at sea in 2022. For more information check out the blog maintained by Dr. Arellano during the cruise.
Left: Participants in the 50-day East Pacific Rise cruise on R.V. Atlantis (L to R: Dexter Davis, Vanessa Jimenez, Shawn Arellano, Tanika Ladd, Wyatt Heimbichner Goebel). Right: Tube worms and other fauna at a hydrothermal vent on the East Pacific Rise.
Strom Lab: Suzanne is part of a new synthesis project funded by the Long-Term Ecological Research network office: “Response of primary producers and primary consumers to environmental change - from small-scale disturbances to seasonal and long-term changes” This project will bring together researchers from graduate students to senior scientists, across LTER sites from terrestrial to coastal ocean.
New Publications:
Sobocinski, K.L., Harvell, C.D., Baloy, N.J., Broadhurst, G., Dethier, M.N., Flower, A. and Delaney, J.R., Urban seas as hotspots of stress in the Anthropocene ocean: The Salish Sea example. Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene (2022) 10 (1): 00055. https://doi.org/10.1525/elementa.2022.00055.
Strom, S., and the Northern Gulf of Alaska Long-Term Ecosystem Research Team. 2023. Recent marine heatwaves affect marine ecosystems from plankton to seabirds in the northern Gulf of Alaska. In Frontiers in Ocean Observing: Emerging Technologies for Understanding and Managing a Changing Ocean. E.S. Kappel et al., eds, Oceanography 36(Supplement 1), https://doi.org/10.5670/oceanog.2023.s1.9.
Graduate Degrees Awarded:
Robert Beck: Microplastics and performance of the anemone Anthopleura elegantissima. Environmental Science, Fall 2022, advisor Brian Bingham
Meghan Bugaj: Avian and shallow water community response to Pacific herring (Clupea pallasii) spawn events. Environmental Science, Fall 2022, advisor Kathryn Sobocinski.
Elizabeth Diehl: Promoting pinto abalone (Haliotis kamtschatkana) recovery in the Salish Sea: The effects of fluctuating temperature and elevated CO2 on survival, growth, and radula morphology. Biology, Fall 2022, advisor Deborah Donovan.
Allyson Lombardo: The toxicity of dopamine on Salish Sea phytoplankton. Biology, Winter 2023, advisor Brady Olson. Megan O’Hara: Distribution and mixotrophy of cryptophyte phytoplankton in the northern Gulf of Alaska. Environmental Science, Winter 2023, advisor Suzanne Strom
Heidi Stewart: Species distribution and abundance of Bering Sea tunicates with implications for coastal food security. Environmental Science, Fall 2022, advisor Kathryn Sobocinski.
Congratulations to all of these hard-working students!
Newsletter content prepared by Suzanne L. Strom (stroms@wwu.edu) unless otherwise specified.