Orpheus Island Round 2

Posted Thursday, June 4th, 2015 at 10:35pm

Hey peoples! How is everyone? It's been a while hasn't it? I've just been studying my ass off the past four days for finals. I'm actually writing this blog as a way to review what we did on our Orpheus Island trip so there you go.

The trip to Orpheus took place the day after I got back from Wambiana. I was back on campus for only about 12 hours or so. We left at 4:30am on April 28th. We arrived at the island around 8am or so and after getting settled into our accommodation we got our gear on and headed out into the bay. The biggest difference between this trip and the previous corals trip was that we got to use the boats and go to several locations around the bay. During the corals trip we only got to walk out to the point and snorkel from there. Another big difference was that there was no assessment for this trip. That took a large amount of stress off my shoulders and allowed me to enjoy learning for the sake of learning rather than worrying about getting perfect data that I could use on a report several weeks later.

The first exercise that we did was one of the same ones that we did at Reef HQ. My partner and I got into the water, scoped out a 5m x 5m area and started recording all the species of fish in the different families that we saw. We did this in 5 min increments. In the following 5 min increments we only recorded new species that we saw. This continued until we saw very few to no new species. Then we repeated the exercise in the shallow water.

The second exercise they had us do included a series of line transects where we had to count the number of herbivorous fish we saw. More specifically we were looking for parrot fish, butterfly fish and rabbit fish. We chose a point to anchor our 30m tape measure. Then, as I was swimming to the left laying down the tape I counted how many fish of each species in each family I saw. Then my partner followed the line I had just made doing the same thing. Then I swam along the line a third time doing the same thing until I reached the start while my partner coiled up the tape behind me. This was done 4 more times, once to the right, once straight up at a 90 degree angle from the first two, and two more at 45 degree angles on either side. Think of a fan shape.

After that we had time for lunch and time to use the books to identify the species that we had been seeing. After lunch we headed back out on the boat. That is, after we walked across the reef flat for a while. The tide was way too low for the boat. I know at this point we must have done another exercise but I cannot for the life of me think of what it was nor can I tell from the notes I took. I know we started following specific fish and counted how many times they bit a certain type of substrate but that was later in the afternoon because I stopped in the middle of it because I was getting too tired. Maybe we did the 5 line transects after lunch instead of beforehand. We must have. Anyways, we went in for dinner and more fish identification and then we had a short briefing on what we would be doing the following day.

Day 2 we were up at 7am for breakfast and in the water by 8:30am. The morning was busy with three different exercises. The first one was relatively simple. Each group got two samples of live macroalgae and we measured the lengths of each. Then one was anchored in the reef flat and the other was anchored in the reef crest. The results of this to be discussed on day three.

The second exercise, known as the zig-zag, looked at the sizes and distribution of 9 species of herbivorous fish on the inner-reef flat, mid-reef flat, outer-reef flat, the reef crest and the reef slope. This was done by attempting to swim in a straight line between two buoys that were parallel to the shoreline (easier said than done I might add lol). As we went we recorded the species that we saw and sorted them into 5 different size classes: 10-15cm, 15-20cm, 20-25cm, 25-30cm and 30-35cm (also easier said than done). Once we reached the buoy we swam perpendicular to the shore to reach the next starting buoy, either closer to shore or further away.

The third exercise of the morning was affectionately called the super deluxe transect. In the first transect we laid a 30m tape and looked 2.5m to either side of it and counted the number of individual fish in each family that were greater than 10cm long. Then we went back along the line, looking only .5m to either side of it and counted the number of individual fish in each family that were less than 10cm long (there were a LOT). Lastly, because of my ears I can't duck dive, so my partner dove down to look under and all around the corals along the tape, .5m to either side and he counted the number of blennies and gobies he saw.

Lunch and identifying fish as usual. Then another walk over the reef flat and onto the boat for our afternoon session. We got to go to an entirely different area on the far side of the bay for this exercise. We spent the afternoon using clove oil mixed with other chemicals and a net to try and catch some fish. The clove oil makes the fish sleepy but too much could kill them. The fish we caught were going to be used for many things, some of which meant that they were going to be killed once we got back to shore. Honestly, I didn't feel too great about that so I just followed my partner around while he caught fish and I took some time to appreciate how beautiful the reef is. I was also in charge of swimming back to the boat with the fish he caught to turn it in. At one point while I was clearing out my mask he surfaced with a fish and yelled "look at this huge goby I caught!" to which I responded "That's not a goby, it's a blenny!". When I turned the fish into the staff on the boat they asked me "was that your partner who said this was a goby?" I said yes and also told them that I corrected him. My professor went on to say something along the lines of "Hit him across the head for calling it a goby and then give him a hug because the size of this one is quite impressive". I thought that was funny.

After we got to shore we spent a few hours identifying the (now dead) fish that we caught clove oiling. Then the rest of the day ended just like the day before: dinner, identification and a briefing on the next days' exercises.

Day three started with what was most definitely my favorite activity. We got to snorkel along the edges of the mangroves that lined the bay. We saw sting-rays and jellyfish (the relatively harmless ones) and so many different species of fish. It was really cool. Apparently there was a sea turtle as well that I just missed seeing. After that we went and retrieved our algae samples. The results were that the ones in the reef flat were unchanged whereas the ones on the reef crest, well, there was nothing left but the rocks they were anchored to.

Then we did two different behavioral studies which I really enjoyed. The first one was just like the one we did in Reef HQ where we followed cleaner wrasses and observed what fish they liked to clean, which fish liked to be cleaned and how many times they bit/cleaned different species of fish. After that we looked at large groups of several species of damselfish and tried to figure out the social hierarchy between the different species based on social interactions and how close they were to the substratum. I thoroughly enjoyed being able to spend a lot of time watching what they would do and how they would act.

Lunch was the same and then, since we worked so efficiently, we got to do some more clove oil catching for the rest of the day which meant that I just enjoyed the reef in all its beauty.

That night we prepared our data for a presentation. We had dinner and then our final presentation/discussion. It turned out that our professor didn't really care about the numbers and data. He wanted to show us the flaws in each of the exercises we did (and that people have been doing for years and years now) and to emphasize that the field needs new people to come up with new ways to conduct these studies.

The next morning we got packed up and headed back to campus. Overall I was so happy that we got to see so many different areas of the reef. I also got to see the huge colonies of my coral that I was studying in my other class that I didn't get to see when I was on the corals trip. Really I have no words to describe the beauty of the reef and it does make me sad to think that what I saw is only a fraction of what it used to be and it will only continue to decline if we as inhabitants of this world, not just this country, but the whole world, don't step up our game and take care of this beautiful gift that has been given to us. Even though it was an extremely busy three and a half days, I wouldn't have traded the experience for anything. It was by far the greatest experience that I've had here in Australia so far.

If you get a chance, even though I can't show you the reef, go check out my pictures of the sunsets there. I was finally able to get a few and they're stunning. Hope everyone is enjoying their summer break back home in the States. Wish me luck on my finals! Almost done! Later peoples!