We're Luuunching in the Rain

Outdoor Dining at Agrihan

We haven't seen the sun in five days but at least it has stopped raining.  Yesterday the downpours were hard enough that we would have had a ball of mushy bread and lunch meat if we had tried to have lunch in the small boat.  Jason, our coxswain, pulled out the sea anchor which is a large parachute, to use as a tarp.  We strung it from the roof of the boat to the stern and created our own lunch fort.  We must have looked like a boat of derelicts but we were warm and dry.  Most days we get lunchmeat, tuna salad or egg salad and bread, which can get a bit dull.  We spice things up by adding string cheese or chips to the sandwich.  I've seen carrots added but there is no need to go overboard.  My favorite is Pringles for some extra texture.  But on days where it is just as wet topside as in the water, it is hard to warm up between dives.  To keep us from turning blue the Chief Steward has been sending us out with thermos' of soup.  Today it was Cream of Broccoli - my favorite so far.  I've got some extra saved in the fridge for tomorrow's dinner.

Jason still remembers how to build a fort.

Soup Kitchen is open.

Not what Jacques Cousteau would have had, but still good.

I hope you are having a wonderful night and staying dry.
Take care,
Cristi

Octopus

We rarely get a chance to see an octopus on our dives and I've never seen one out of its hole, but on our last day at Saipan, we were able to watch one come out of its hole and swim across the reef.  Most octopuses have no internal or external skeleton, allowing them to squeeze into small holes for protection.  Unlike squid, that have a vestige of an internal shell and tentacles, the arms of an octopus have suction cups on them and can be used as muscular appendages.  For defense against moray eels and other predatory fish, they will typically hide, use color-changing camouflage, flee quickly, or expel ink like a smoke screen.  They have a hard beak, with the mouth at the center point of the arms, and all octopuses are venomous.  However, only the Blue-Ringed Octopus is deadly to humans and you would have to try hard to get an octopus to bite you.  They are also highly intelligent and are considered the most intelligent invertebrate, with evidence of both short and long-term memory.  An octopus' life span is relatively short with some smaller species living only 6 months and some of the larger ones living up to 5 years.  Both the male and female octopus will die shortly after mating.  Another unusual aspect to octopuses is that they have three hearts.  Two hearts pump blood through each of the two gills and the third pumps blood through the body.

The octopus that we saw started in its hole, then gradually emerged and swam across the reef alighting on a few coral heads on the way.  It went up the reef slope and then evidently encountered another octopus because we saw some sort of commotion with a lot of arms.  Then another smaller octopus returned to a hole close to where we were.  It was a very impressive show.

What you will normally see of an octopus if you are lucky.  They blend in very well to the surrounding reef.

This one is deciding to leave its hole.

Almost vacated...

And he's off.

He landed on this coral head before taking off again across the reef.

I hope you're having a wonderful day.  I am off to our morning dive briefing and then small boat launching.

Take care,

Cristi

The Sulfur Seeps of Maug

We woke today to squalls covering Maug, a group of three islands that form the rim of a submerged caldera of an ancient volcano.  There are no known eruptions since the discovery of Maug in 1522 but the NOAA Vents program has been exploring the Mariana Trench area for submerged volcanic activity.  The caldera is about 1.5 miles wide and averages 600 feet deep with a twin-peaked lava dome that rises in the center to within 60 feet of the surface.  Our dive sites are located both inside and outside of the caldera with one hopefully planned for the lava dome area.  

The most spectacular site of the day was on the inside edge of the north island.  We dropped into an area that had 100% coral cover for as far as the eye could see.  The coral, Plate and Pillar Coral (Porites rus), extended from the top of the reef slope at 20 feet to at least 100 feet deep (after which we couldn't see the bottom).  As we followed the slope around a bend, we came to an area that looked like a land slide of orange mud and was completely devoid of coral.  As we got closer, we noticed that there were little bubbles coming up from the mud and when I put my hand down, it was hot to the touch.  We had found sulfur seeps!  We took time trying to snap pictures of the bubbling mud and one of our scientists even went barefoot, just to wiggle her toes in the sand.  Too soon it was time to go back to the surface for more rain squalls and a trip back to the ship.  We will be at Maug for the next two days and I'm looking forward to what else it has in store.

I hope your night is going well.  Here are a few pictures to keep you going ...

Take care,

Cristi

Plate and Pillar Coral


Purple Queen Fish and a Cleaner Wrasse


Entering mud slide area

The bubbles are sulfur coming from submerged volcanic activity


One of our scientists refusing to come up from the dive and into yet another rain storm

Uracus and the Steves

Our dive sites today were at Farallon de Pajaros (Birds Rock) or Uracus; the northern-most island in the Marianas Archipelago that covers less than a square mile and is slightly south of Iwo Jima, Japan.  Like the other islands that we've visited since leaving Saipan, Uracus is an active volcano being caused by the Philippine Sea tectonic plate moving onto the Pacific plate.  It's most recent eruption was in 1943 but the island is still mostly devoid of plants, so there is nothing to prevent runoff of soil and rocks into the water.  We noticed the effects of this immediately upon starting our dives.  Visibility was very limited, especially within the top 20' feet of the surface.  We would descend through a murky cloud of green that would open up to slightly clearer water at 40-50 feet depth.  One of the sites was so murky that a team who was working within feet of a transect line - watching the line - looked up to check on the other divers and were not able to find the line when they looked back down.  They finally had to surface, swim back to the float marking the start of the line and try again.  The underwater sites left a bit to be desired, probably because of the large amount of sedimentation from the land. All of the dive sites were covered in black sand and large boulders without much coral or algae.  

However there were highlights to this island.  On our second dive we were visited by a large school of Spade Fish.  This is probably the best fish that I've seen so far on this trip.  They were between 1 and 1.5 feet in diameter, taller than they were long, and extremely curious.  After I returned to the ship, I was informed that they are named Steve - all of them.  So the school of Steves checked us out for a little bit while we were working and one stayed with us for the rest of the dive.  It was great and more than a bit distracting while trying to work.  I kept wanting to watch what Steve was doing instead of collecting data.

Meet Steve...

...and his friends

I am off to bed for now.

I hope you have a wonderful evening,

Cristi

More time at Pagan

Pagan's North Volcano

Good morning,

We are at Pagan for our third and final day.  After this we move on to Asuncion Island.  There is nothing much to report for now.  Diving has still been good and the weather is holding.  We woke up to another glassy day without as much as a whitecap in sight.  I love those mornings.  The sun was rising over the volcano which made for a wonderful backdrop while prepping dive gear.  I am hoping that we will get to go on island this afternoon, but I'm not sure.  We have three of the Team Leads on our boat and they tend to be less adventurous than the rest of us.  Who knows, maybe they will be up for a swim and beach landing over lunch.

I better be going for now.  We have our morning meeting in just a few minutes.

Take care and have a wonderful day,

Cristi

Our Boat

Pagan Island

Pagan at sunrise

Today we moved on to Pagan Island; two volcanoes joined by a narrow strip of land with one that is still smoking from an earthquake a few months ago.  The island is ~ 18 square miles in total area and is the fourth largest in the Northern Marianas Chain.  It was inhabited in historic times, however a 1981 eruption forced all inhabitants to evacuate and no one has returned.  There are still a few buildings remaining and wild cows and pigs that were left behind.  The above-water landscape is amazing with sea cliffs, black sand beaches, coconut palms, and ironwood trees with a bare cinder cone in the background.  The underwater portion is less than spectacular.  I was surprised but our first dive site was covered almost entirely in a type of bacterial mat that normally only forms when there are too many nutrients in the water.  I am curious to see if this is the case, possibly from recent volcanic activity?  I’ll have to ask the oceanographers after they analyze their water samples for nutrients.  The water is also very warm, 84, so that may have something to do with it.  The second and third dives were boulders in black sand with more coral colonies perched on them.  The highlight was seeing the tow team twice underwater.  It is becoming quite familiar to hear the distinctive whir of their engines as they are now making a habit of including our dive sites in their surveys for data consistency.  Most of the time when we hear that whir we stop working and start watching for the tow line so that we are not surprised when they come past.  When I am not paying attention, I have often felt someone grab the back of my SCUBA tank and start towing me along with them.  But this time I was watching and I was able to take my first towing lesson.  As Ben went past, he motioned to me to take the towboard as he hung on to a trailing line behind it.  Molly, my dive buddy had grabbed on to trailing line on the other board.  I loved skimming above the bottom, much faster than I could swim.  I had to remind myself that I had work to be doing and eventually Molly and I went back to our work.  I think I’ll be watching for the tow team more often.

The Tow Team

I hope you have a wonderful day,

Cristi

Sarigan

All of Sarigan

We had an incredible visit to Sarigan today, the first volcanic, uninhabited island north of Saipan that we've visited so far. This is a tiny island with one side composed of steep cliffs with black sand and boulders underwater.  The north west side of the island looked like a tropical paradise with a small beach and covered by coconut palms.  The dive site on the NW side was amazing.  It was a labyrinth of columns and ridges with incredible coral and fish life.  I was wondering if I could cancel the survey due to insufficient concentration.  At all three dive sites I noticed far more fish than in Saipan or any of the other inhabited islands that we've visited. Even the boulders were beautiful in their own way but the high wave energy of the area and hard bottom seems to prevent many corals from colonizing there.  This was a wonderful introduction to the Northern Marianas islands.

I hope you are doing well and enjoying the day,

Cristi

This is one of our small boats next to the cliffs.

Our first shark siting since Wake.  The area from Guam to Saipan is mostly fished out.

We were surveying between these columns and ridges.  You can see our transect tape in the middle of the picture.

This was the biggest beach we found on Sarigan.

Seeing Small Things

As a member of the Benthic Team, I document what I see along the bottom every 6 inches for a total of 150' at each dive site. This means that I spend most of my time with my head between coral heads and algae, so I miss a lot of the cool fish and what not that may be swimming past me. But one benefit of looking that closely at the bottom is that I get to see a lot of the small things that I would otherwise overlook. 

One such creature is the nudibranch. Literally its name means 'Naked Gills' which is appropriate because it breathes through a set of bushy external appendages on its back, sort of like wearing your lungs on your back. Nudibranchs, also sometimes called sea slugs, are a group of shell-less snails that live in all oceans of the world and at almost every depth. They are often very colorful but are easily overlooked because they are usually less than an inch long. They tend to be carnivorous, feeding on sponges, anemones, or other sea slugs and the 'horns' that you see at the front are actually sensory organs used for touch, taste and smell. They defend themselves either by blending into the algae or coral around them or by using bright colors to indicate that they are poisonous. I particularly like them because they're very photogenic and patient for the camera. These are what I've found so far on this trip.

Have a wonderful evening,
Cristi

The Blue Grotto, Saipan

After over a month at sea and 50 dives, we came into the port of Saipan. We had 3 days on land and we needed to work for at least 2 of them. So you may wonder what did we do on our day off? Go diving of course. Yep - I find this rather amusing myself, but Friday morning bright and early at 6am I was prepping dive gear. Eight of us piled into a minivan and made our way to a dive site called the Blue Grotto. When you drive up, you can't tell that you are near the water. From the parking lot, it looks like you are on top of a set of sea cliffs and a good hike inland from the coast. So we geared up next to the van and made our way down a staircase that opened up into a vertical tube with 100' cliffs, a pool of saltwater at the bottom (complete with crashing waves) and a rock in the middle of the pool. The trick is to clamber out onto the rock so that you can jump off the far side into 30' deep water. And like the little crabs that scurry back into the water when they are spooked, we all tumbled off the rock on the far side, more or less gracefully. From there you drop down to about 40' deep and you can see that the tube is fed by 3 massive tunnels leading out to the open water at the base of the sea cliffs. The tunnels themselves are ~ 40' high and 70' wide and are the real highlight of the area. Once out in the open we found a wave-scoured area with numerous fish, fan and wire corals. All of these have been sparse so far around other islands in this archipelago so it was a treat. We even found Nemo.

I am off to prep more dive gear for now. We are back at work around Saipan.
I hope you have a wonderful day,
Cristi

Last Day at Tinian

Good morning!
We finished surveys around Tinian yesterday and it was the first really spectacular weather day that we've had. It was sunny skies and flat water with not a swell or white cap in site. The last few islands that we've been around, Guam, Rota, Aguijan, and Tinian, have all been composed of limestone that has been dissolved through the years by the pounding waves and rain. This has left really amazing caves and overhangs that you can see from the water. Some of the caves are at the water's edge and others are half way up the cliff face. I haven't seen anything like this before and it has made for some dramatic transits between survey sites. The diving has also been very calm but unfortunately the reefs appear very degraded. We saw a great deal of coral death and a type of bacteria that forms mats over everything. This is generally found when there are too many nutrients in the water possibly from agriculture or housing runoff. We still found interesting things to look at and it was nice to be in an area where we weren't getting pushed around by the swells. It was as calm as being in a swimming pool - really wonderful.

Unfortunately, our small boat, HI-1, wasn't having as good of a day as we were. It has been having intermittent transmission troubles for the last few days which clear up whenever we bring the engineers out. On our last dive, we could hear the boat and the rhythmic knocking as if there was tribal music playing. This was a new aspect to our dive that we hadn't heard previously. Then everything went quiet and as we were swimming back to the boat, we noticed that the anchor line was down - not a good sign. The boat had evidently stopped working all together and a tow boat from the ship was on the way to bring us home. So we had a very quiet, slow ride back with plenty of time to consider the luxury of such a large diving platform versus the inflatable Avon that we will be using until HI-1 is up and running again. So begins our adventures aboard Avons! Wish us luck ...

I hope you're having a wonderful day,

Cristi

Our Tow Boat...


By the way, I haven't figured out how to change the post time on my blog. So in case you were wondering, I'm not awake at all hours of the night typing diligently on the blog. I actually tend to find my bunk by 9pm. Sleep well.

Happy Easter!

I wanted to send a quick note before the dives today just to say good morning and Happy Easter! Egg decorating was successful and had a great turnout.  Even the CO (Commanding Officer) joined the fun.  We're at Tinian today, another small island just north of Guam and 3 days away from our next import. Ben's boat is in the process of being loaded and I have two more small boats to go before it's my turn.    I have to go get geared up now, but have a wonderful day and I'll write more soon.  

Take care,

Cristi

Getting Ready for Easter Egg Decorating

We have completed diving at Rota and Aguijan, two small islands north of Guam, and are on our way to Tinian.  Luckily data entry for tonight is almost complete as easter egg decorating will begin in 15 minutes!  We have already been discussing color palettes and are looking forward to a few hours of candy, eggs and dye.  Should be fun.  If you see the Easter Bunny, be sure to wish him good luck since he has a long swim to make to the ship this evening - we are a day ahead of the mainland and so E. Bunny will be beginning his deliveries tonight.  Fortunately for him, we have seen virtually no large fish to get in his way.

I hope you are having a wonderful evening.

Take care,

Cristi

What do I do?

It has been asked, and rightfully so, what it is that I do out here? Why does someone pay me to SCUBA dive? I work for the Coral Reef Ecosystem Division (CRED) of the Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center. This program has been monitoring the health of coral reefs around all Pacific islands under US jurisdiction every 2 years since 2002. I dive with a team of 8 people and the goal is to evaluate the overall health of the coral reef at each site we visit. We lay out two transect lines (75’ measuring tapes) that we swim along taking measurements. We can use this as a representative sample of the environment in that particular area. I identify what is on the bottom every 6” along the line - coral, algae, sea star, sponge, etc. - so that at the end of the dive I can list the species and calculate the percentage of the bottom that is covered by each of them. I can compare this data to past years to see what, if anything, is changing. This is helpful in spotting invasive species or when things such as corals are dying off. For example, when a ship runs aground on the reef, a lot of contaminants are spilled into the water. This will often cause an algal bloom for many years afterwards, which can overgrow the coral. It is important to know what the environment was like beforehand to be able to tell how much damage was done and how, if possible, to correct it. The rest of the members of my team do similar things with small fish (less than 18”), invertebrates (sea stars, urchins, anemones, hermit crabs, etc) and coral. The coral divers count the total number of coral colonies and measure them. This allows them to see if new corals are coming in to an area or if there has been some sort of die off.

The two other teams on the ship are oceanography and the tow team. The oceanography team deploys instruments to measure a wide variety of parameters such as nutrients, pH, currents, and temperature. This helps to complete the picture of what is happening in the water around these islands. The tow team (Ben’s team) circles the islands in a small boat, towing two divers behind them at 1-2mph and 5-10’ above the bottom. These divers are able to cover a much larger area than someone free swimming, photograph/video the bottom, and count the large fish (greater than 18”). There are not that many large fish living close to the reef, so to get an idea of their population size, it is necessary to cover larger areas. All of this data is generally used to monitor the state of the reefs, not restore them. However other agencies use our data to launch restoration projects and make decisions about how to manage their reefs. For example, after the governor of Samoa learned that the amount of large fish around Samoa, a heavily populated area, was much lower than around other islands in Pacific, he proposed closing the fishery for large fishes. On the other hand, when the governor of the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas Islands found that large fish generally remained only around the most remote northern islands, he proposed holding a fishing tournament there. So unfortunately we can’t control how our data is used, but some good does come of it. The decisions to create the Northern Hawaiian Islands and the Pacific Remote Island Areas Marine National Monuments were both based largely on data that CRED has collected through the years.

I hope this helps in understanding what it is we do out here.

Take care and goodnight,
Cristi

Swishy Diving

I wanted to post a quick message to let everyone know that we are still diving and happy at Guam. Ben joined the cruise a few days ago and this was our second day of diving here. Today’s dives were good but rather swishy. The swell would carry us about 10 feet in either direction while we were trying to collect data. Fun, fun, fun. One of the divers on our boat came up seasick and all four members of the tow team (Ben's boat) were almost compelled to feed the fishies while diving. Good thing for the ‘almost’. But we are back on the ship and with a dinner of roasted lamb chops, life is very good.  Life is also unfortunately very busy.  Since starting this leg of the cruise, I have taken on a new role and so my workload has increased dramatically. It is 8:30pm and I am nowhere near being finished with entering data. So I will let a glimpse of one of our recent dives speak a thousand words instead of me. I hope all is well where you are and that you enjoy the movie.
Take care,
Cristi

Land Ho – well, sort of

At 2:45pm on March 31, the island of Guam was sited off our starboard bow, however I think I will have to wait a few more hours to actually be able to see anything distinct. It still looks like a dark spot on the horizon and if you use your imagination and squint, you could make out a palm tree or two. Not really, but you can start to make out some of the mountains (the picture was taken much later). This sighting comes as sort of a bittersweet tease. I have been spending the last 3 days working on the computer for 10-12 hours each day and I have another 48 hours until work is done. This might not sound that difficult until I mention that our desks are in a 20x20 room with 12 other people (and the associated conversations), music often coming from one or more computers and a ping pong table 3 feet behind me. Today I have been ducking paddles and balls consistently since 9am and I must say that the amount of work I’ve gotten done is remarkably small. At this point, even with the use of earplugs, I would pay for a bit of peace and quiet that hopefully the island will provide. As soon as all my work and dives are done and I can get off on my own in Guam, I will hopefully be gone, not to see anyone from the ship for a good 36 hours. If I’m really lucky, Ben will have time to come with me. I must not be the only person feeling the need of some solitude. I just heard a conversation between two scientists that included: “Please just don’t talk to or interact with me for the rest of the day.” This was said to one of our more vociferous personnel. In the year that I’ve known this person, it has been extremely rare to see and not hear her. I have even heard her talking underwater - I didn’t know that could be done, but I guess she was determined.
For now I will get back to work. I hope you are having a wonderful, quiet morning.
Take care,
Cristi

Last Day At Wake

On our last day at Wake, we were able to go on land for a short, guided tour of the atoll. As much as the waters surrounding Wake were beautiful, the land portion was sobering. With heaps of rusted metal littering the landscape and the remnants of the 2008 category 5 Super Typhoon Ioke still visible, the atoll’s decrepit appearance mirrored its harrowing past. Evidence of nature’s destructive force was not nearly as potent as the WWII era relics found through out the atoll. From 1935 to 1941, Wake was a refueling point for Pan Am and at the beginnings of WWII, the atoll was inhabited by 449 Marines, 68 Naval personnel and 1221 civilian contractors. In 1941, a few hours after the Pearl Harbor attack, the Battle of Wake Atoll began. Grossly outnumbered by the Japanese fleet and with only 4 remaining fighter aircraft and the help of the civilian contractors, the Marines and Naval personnel were able to repel several amphibious assaults, sink 2 destroyers, 1 submarine and destroy 24 Japanese aircraft before being overwhelmed by an early-morning raid on December 23. After the Japanese victory, most of the military personnel and civilians were sent to POW camps in Asia. However 98 civilian contractors were detained on the island and forced into slave labor to improve the island’s defenses. After a successful American air raid on October 5, 1943, the Japanese garrison commander ordered the execution of all 98 prisoners. One man escaped the massacre and was able to carve the message ’98 US PW 5-10-43’ on a rock near the site of the prisoners’ mass grave. This man was later captured and executed.

Today there are approximately 150 Naval contractors living and working on the island, maintaining the airstrip as an emergency stopping point for trans-Pacific flights. ‘Downtown’ Wake is comprised of several cinder block buildings, a tiki shack and a few hammocks overlooking the turquoise waters of the lagoon. Its peaceful appearance belies the historical reminders cluttering the rest of the atoll and the surrounding waters. I am glad that we were able to visit, however even amongst our usually-lively group, there were very few smiles and most people seemed to be at a loss for words.

I hope you are doing well. Take care,
Cristi

Still diving and happy

Scrawled Filefish

Just a quick post to say that things are going well out here with lots of diving, pictures and data entry.  Our internet connection has been slow to non-existent for the past few days so that combined with a happily exhausted Cristi has led to the slim pickings of blog posts.  But not to worry, I thought I would put up a few pictures for your viewing pleasure until work slows down enough to write more.  Until then, I hope you are doing well and that life is good.
Take care,
Cristi

School of Big-Eyed Jack

Reef with Yellow Tang

Arc-Eye Hawkfish

Reef with Convict Tang

The Last Stand of the Bulbometopon

For the last two days we have been diving at Wake Atoll, one of the last major stomping grounds of the Bumphead Parrotfish (Bulbometopon). This fish is supposed to be found everywhere from the Red Sea and the east coast of Africa to the Line Islands, Samoa Islands and the Great Barrier Reef. However it is becoming increasingly rare due to its tastiness on the dinner plate. It will not be found on menus in the US but in places like Guam and Samoa, it is possible to see it in the back of pick up trucks on its way to someone's kitchen. It is the largest of the parrotfish, so named because the front teeth fuse to form something that looks like a beak. If you can imagine running into a fish with a beak that bites through coral, that is swift and agile like smaller fish, up to 5 feet in length, and with a large rhinoceros-like bump on its head, you can see that you would be somewhat in shock and wondering if you should get out of the water. Although it might have a reason to hold a grudge against humans, it is not a threat to divers and is actually an amazing sight to behold due to its rarity. On our second dive yesterday, we were graced with a school of over 60 of these celebrities of the sea. We were at 70' in a very strong current, doing our best to hold on, and this school casually passed through, against the current, as if out for a stroll. Quite impressive. So far Wake has been everything that we expected and more.
I hope you are having a wonderful evening eating tasty non-endangered things.
Take care,
Cristi

Where Are We?

You might be wondering, after 9 days at sea and not hearing anything about diving, where exactly in the world are we. Well, a good guess would in the Pacific but if you would like to know more specifics, we are ~ 2200 miles west of Honolulu. The brown dots are all the places we work on various cruises and the star is Wake Atoll. We have about 100 more miles to go before we arrive at Wake sometime tonight and begin our dive operations tomorrow morning. If the weather holds, we will be spending the next 5 days there before transiting 1500 miles southwest to Guam. There we will get a few days on land and a change of the science crew before starting our dive surveys around Guam and the Northern Marianas Islands. I am excited to get in the water tomorrow and I'm hoping that it will be calm enough to launch small boats in the morning. So far the forecast is for a 15 foot swell but we'll see what tomorrow brings. Wish us luck and good dive sites.
Be well, do good work...
Cristi