Whale Necropsy in Wilmington

Being home has presented me with many new opportunities. I have come full circle and am reunited with my friends in the local marine science community at NOAA and at the Cabrillo Aquarium. As such, last week I was notified that a large female humpback whale had been brought into the Port of Los Angeles on the bow of a container ship. Whether the ship was the cause or not remains unknown and preliminary visual examinations were inconclusive.

The entire day was spent working with students, NOAA personnel, and support staff from local marine mammal rehabilitation centers and the Cabrillo Marine Aquarium with the necessary assistance of the LA City workers to get the carcass out of the water and as accessible as possible so that the necropsy and specimen collection could be performed. Conditions were less than optimal- the tide was too low, the channel through which the whale brought out of the water was too narrow, and we had about 5 or 6 hours to do everything. Not to mention, the whale was being dragged up and out by the fluke (tail) which, under immense tension, disconnected from the whale, posing a problem for towing the whale back out to sea.

Once the whale was out, we got to work on it. The first step was to relieve the pressure of gas in the visceral cavity, which at this point was quite bloated. This part is always fun. Carefully placed incisions must be made, and not too quickly so as to avoid a literal explosion of whale entrails. The overarching goal was to determine whether the death of the whale occurred before the ship-strike, or as a result of it. In order to do this, musculo-skeletal tissue samples were collected from both flanks of the whale. Assuming the whale was only hit on one side, that side should display damage. The specimens are then analyzed and compared to determine time of death. That is my oversimplified understanding of the process. Although occurrences like this seem to be unfortunately increasing in frequency, they are still relatively rare. As such the opportunity to collect other samples for research purposes was taken. We collected fecal, blubber, lice, and barnacle samples.

Aside from being over the top stinky, it was quite a fulfilling day. Made some new friends and got to reconnect with old. It was surprisingly a ton of work to do everything that needed to be done. It made me think of the old days when whaling was prevalent and a driver of society. They would be on ships for many months at a time and would process many whales every day.

On a different note, I will be starting the EFP project in San Diego that I had mentioned in my previous post this coming month, and I am very excited about it. I have already undergone my training, and it will be much more laid back than what I am used to. More play than work, really.

When Hell Freezes Over, Then Melts And Reveals Something New...

I write this in retrospect, but there was still one trip remaining of the three trips of my contract on longliners. We fished in the Gulf, then went all the way back up to the frozen north Bering for a week and a half or so, then back to the Gulf again before heading home. Fishing wasn't spectacular, the days dragged. We spent a lot of time steaming around searching for fish. Crew morale was low. My morale was low. I was worn down thin and was more than ready to be finished with the trip and off of the boat. Out of almost a full 90 day contract, only a few days were spent on land. I was mentally, physically, and emotionally taxed to my limit. It was time to come home for a while.

In life, plans change, sometimes in directions that we hadn't initially expected. All we can do is smile and continue forward, and make something of it.

My plan has indeed changed, and my gaze shifted to another part of the horizon. I have worked hard aboard nearly every vessel type that the Alaska program has to offer and in all seasons and conditions, and been allowed to see things many have only dreamt of. But it is time to move on to something new and perspective changing.

There are many new possible work opportunities that I am pursuing, but most recently, with my current company, I have been asked to work in San Diego aboard Exempted Fishing Permit (EFP) Swordfish vessels. EFP means that they are fishing for research purposes- that purpose being to try and reduce marine mammal and sea turtle take in the swordfish industry. I think I will have to change the description of my blog, as it will be taking a new direction and tone.

More to come.

Eruption!

The convenient (but monotonous) thing about longliners is that once you have worked on one, generally, you have worked on them all. The only variable is where you collect your fish from, and how many segments of gear will the boat set in one string. My confidence level was quite high upon embarking this new vessel. This changed as soon as we left the dock, which is when I realized I had left my fish identification guides on my last boat. The guides are a critical component in doing my job correctly, especially when there are many fish that I have not seen before. I was taken back to my childhood and once again felt like that forgetful kid who had been dropped off at school, went to class, and realized that he had left his backpack containing the entirely of his homework, classwork, paper, and writing utensils at home. It is a floundering feeling that I hadn’t experienced in a very long time. Luck was on my side this trip, as there were only a few fish that I had not seen before and was unable to identify to the species level.

Castle Rock in the Aleutians

As is the case with most, this trip was not without remarkable occurrences. The weather was better for the most part, as we were fishing solely in the Gulf of AK which resides in a lower latitude than the Bering does. This boat was quite a bit different from what I was used to. They would set significantly more gear in the water, and would bring it back aboard very quickly making my job much faster paced.

Mount Shishaldin - highest peak (volcano) in the Aleutians

There was much to see, while steaming through the Gulf. In the Bering, there is nothing but ocean as far as the eye can see. But in the Gulf, we passed through many different straights and by many islands, many of which were volcanic and active. One evening when I was working, I heard the captain tell the deckhands and I over the hailer mic to take a look to 1 o'clock. Rising above the clouds off in the distance was the pinnacle of a volcano (I later learned was Pavlof Volcano). However, rising above that, much more visibly, was a huge plume of ash and smoke, like I had never seen in real life- only on television. The volcano was erupting before our very eyes! I wished I had my camera, but I could not stop working, and by the time I was finished processing my sample, it was too dark to see anything, and the cloud had dissipated significantly by the next day. That is definitely a memory I will take with me for a long time. I did however, get some photographs of them after the eruption.

After this trip, as always, I was anxious to get off the boat and get my legs moving and jumped off the boat as soon as we landed to do some more local exploration. I walked up the coastline up Captain's Bay as far as I could until I reached the mouth of a river that I could not pass. As I could not venture any further up the bay, I veered inland and followed the river as far as I could. There was no trail to follow. I stumbled across a little cemetery with just a few headstones. They were Russian Orthodox Crosses, which is a prevalent religious denomination in Alaska, but especially in Kodiak and Dutch Harbor. It was an eerie sight.

I had planned to make it back to the boat for lunch but still had quite a bit of time to kill, so I reconnected with road further inland and meandered my way back to where the pots are stacked against the side of the hill. I could see a small glacier-like structure and a hint of a waterfall way up a ravine. Being me, I had to find it. So I hiked up to the hill, through a sort of small mining setup until I reached the ravine, which had a small creek running through it. I made my way up it until I passed by the melting icy structure that I had spotted from down below, then another length that took me to the waterfall. I spent at least a half an hour relaxing at the base of it- it was supremely serene and I could be alone with my thoughts and the sound of the water crashing against the rock ahead of me and the trickling of the brook beside me. There's nothing quite like it.

Drinks And Exploration In Dutch Harbor

I’ve been to Dutch a couple times now, but this is the first time that I have been able to explore Dutch Harbor and the island of Unalaska. The first (and last) time I was here, I was deployed to a boat upon arrival, and left immediately following disembarkation. Having a little time between boats was a welcomed opportunity. Dutch Harbor is fairly small, but sits sheltered between two islands connected by a bridge. My company’s bunkhouse lies on one island which just so happens to be the one with fewer amenities- primarily residents living in “The Valley”. One can see where Alaska Ship Supply, Safeway, the UniSea Plant, a couple of restaurants, and the local bar, “The Norwegian Rat” are from near our bunkhouse, and it is not very far away. However, to get there, the bridge has to be crossed, which is a deceivingly distant walk. I get little cardiovascular activity on the boats, so I always embrace an opening to get some, and have no problem making the walk. It is between that, or taking a cab at $20 each way. I'll walk.

While at the bunkhouse, I connected with a good friend who was in port for a short time before leaving on another trip. His boat was docked at the plant on the other island. We had talked about doing a quick hike before he went back out again. In order for us to have enough time to make the hike, I had to be at his boat in 45 minutes, and it was almost a 2 hour walk. Cabs in Dutch are cash only- I had none, nor did I want to shell out $40 even if I did. Being a small community where everyone knows everyone, I had heard that hitchhiking was acceptable and decided to try my hand (or thumb, rather) at it. I had never done it before, as where I live, you either can’t trust hitchhikers if you are the driver, or can’t trust most drivers willing to pick up hitchhikers. After walking a ways, I saw a van with a company logo on it pass by and decided to give it a try, half not expecting it to work. Sure enough, he pulled over and motioned to hop in. The driver seemed friendly enough, so I asked if he was heading towards UniSea and he said he’d give me a ride down the road. Saving me a good hour or more walk, I made it to the UniSea Bar and met up with my friend right on time. We had some lunch and a few beers and caught up for a bit. Not deliberately, the job is usually the topic of choice, as we all have our own unique experiences, both positive and negative, that we feel compelled to share amongst ourselves, as if to validate them.

The UniSea plant reminded me of the fishing sector of the port back home, but much busier. Smell is about as effective at painting a picture as sight is- the creosote in the wood pilings; the diesel of the boat motors; the cold, salty air, fish being processed, and seaweed on the nearby shoreline; all come together create something that takes you back in time. Little has changed in a hundred years.

After lunch, my friend and I made our way up to Bunker Hill. This mountain, aptly named, was used during WWII as a gun and bunker emplacement with a 360 degree view of the entire harbor. Opting for the shorter but steeper route to the top, we trekked up a hidden trail through over a foot of snow. We passed many eagles’ nests nestled in the side of the hill. After a short while we made it to the bunker and explored the inside, which had two levels, one of which you had to climb down a ladder to access. The view was spectacular and I was glad to have made the ascent.

The following day, my friend was gone, but my need to get out and explore had not been fully satisfied. After breakfast, I left the bunkhouse and walked up the road leading deeper into the valley. After a short distance, the houses disappeared, but the road kept going. First the houses vanished; paved road gave way to dirt road, dirt road to snow. There was still clearly a path beneath the snow, and as usual, my curious side begged me to keep going and see what lie at the end of the road, which was still not yet in sight. The snow kept getting deeper and deeper, but I kept pressing on. I took a detour off of the road toward what appeared to be the edge of a large ravine, likely carved out by the river running along the side of the road I had followed. Sure enough, that’s what it was, and it was headed by a stunning waterfall. The weather this day was uncharacteristically beautiful- almost cloudless sapphire skies behind ashen mountains, and now a steep waterfall. Hiking alone, it is hard not to feel like you are the one who discovered such a wonder, still knowing, but ignoring that it has been seen by hundreds if not thousands before.

After lingering in admiration for a time, I continued up what I had interpreted to be the continuation of the path, though it had all but disappeared; the only tracks present were my own. Intuition led me to a sign that advertised that I had reached the Pyramid Peak Trailhead. I had heard about this trail, but decided to turn around and save that adventure for another day, as I was alone, and the snow was still quite deep. I was to be deployed to my second longliner, the Arctic Prowler on the following day.

Fisherman Lingo [UN-CENSORED] (Relatively)

Me: Morning [insert fisherman’s name here].

Fisherman: Go f**k yourself (said playfully).

Me: *"up yours" arm motion.

Such is the beginning of a typical day in the workplace. If there is one thing I have learned from this giant social experiment, it is to laugh, and not take what guys say too seriously, but with a grain of salt. Be confident, and be able to jestingly give it back to them, but without going too far. Fisherman generally have a sense of humor that varies from sarcasm, to making fun of themselves (or you), to not having graduated beyond phallic jokes. Middle fingers fly frequently. It is a hard balance for the good observer to find, that allows them to be professional in what I would say is a primarily less than professional environment.

The way I see it, we can have a positive, neutral, or negative relationship with our boat. I try to strive for a positive and friendly relationship as much as possible- as I do not think this and doing the job correctly and professionally are mutually exclusive. Life is better when you get along with your crew. It turns what for some can be a very lonely job- born of the neutral or negative relationship- into something socially bearable, in addition to them being more receptive to helping you whenever you need it.

Part of getting the crew’s respect is going the extra mile, and not being a minimalist. I try to do at least one thing that is helpful to the crew on each boat that also gives me an opportunity to do something fishing and not observing related, just for fun. For example, on the pot boat I was on, I would occasionally help the crew members bleed their cod if I had some extra time between samples, in addition to bleeding my own after I was done processing them for my sample. They appreciated this, and were therefore happy to help when I needed it. On the longliner I just got off of, they let me use the pole gaff to get fish that had dropped off of the line before the boat could attain it. I actually got quite good at it, at least as good as any of the others. I even got to be the roller-man for short periods of time between samples. The roller-man gaffs the fish and brings them aboard the vessel before they have an opportunity to fall off of the hook. This I did not get quite so good at, but they were appreciative of the effort nonetheless. This again, resulted in them being quite happy to provide assistance when it was required.

Aside from the freely flowing derogatory language, there is also the opposite occurrence in the form of language barriers. The Alaska fishing industry attracts not only personalities, but nationalities from all over the world, some of which speak English, but with accents so thick, you have to take the bits that you understand and try to reconstruct what they are saying, and it is often wrong. There is nothing wrong with that, just spices up the experience even more. For example, there was a Vietnamese fisherman on my last boat that I could understand about 5% during our conversations. I would laugh because I thought he was trying to tell me something funny, but then he would say “No! Not funny!” And then I would feel silly, but would be inclined to laugh more at the fact that I had no clue what we had been talking about for the previous 10 minutes. Finding a diplomatic way out of a monologue is an art that I am working on.

On a different and last note, what makes everything worth it is when you talk to a fisherman that understands your cause, and thanks you for your hard work. It may have been because of his youth and lack of cranky cynicism that is typical of older fisherman, but I appreciate it no less.

Winter Wonderland

As is typical of every new boat I embark, as I mentioned in my previous post, longlining presents new and different challenges. But as always once you do them a few times, all slips into routine, and I wonder why I allowed myself to get so stressed out about it. I suppose I stress because of the uncertainty of each new vessel type and their sampling methods, as well wanting to do my job right and be the best at it. But I am noticing that the stress level diminishes a little bit with each progressive boat, and now, having done all but one vessel type that the North Pacific Program offers, I feel quite self-sufficient and confident about my performance and abilities, and really no longer stress at all. It is quite a liberating feeling.

J-Hook

Despite what I have heard about longliners being one of the most difficult vessel types to work on, I really quite enjoyed it. I felt that my quality of data was much better than that which I was collecting on trawlers, which seemed much more subjective. The easiest part about it was also at times the most challenging. I would stand on the upper deck above where the fish were being landed and tally every fish on the line for my designated portions of the set. This in itself is very easy. However, this time of year, it is very cold, and even the special warm mustang suits that they issue us don’t always do the trick. Most notably when the wind picks up, it will find any little open nook and cranny in the suit and chill you to the bone. Worse yet, the rubber gloves and cotton glove liners are terribly un-insulating in these conditions, which is perhaps the most uncomfortable part of the whole ordeal. Additionally I have to concentrate below me on thousands of consecutive hooks that come up to ensure that no organism is missed or double-tallied. This can be, literally, a huge pain in the neck. But, I can’t complain too much about this- I am dealing with a minimal number of fish for my weight samples so the lifting and dirty/smelly factor is significantly decreased from what I am used to. I have to count hooks in the gear room to get an idea of how many hooks are contained in an average set, which is monotonous and time consuming, but easy. I have to do more frequent gear verification to ensure that the number of segments of line with hooks contained in a set is indeed what the vessel reports. It really comes down to: Am I working more? Yes. Am I working harder? No.

At my tally station awaiting my designated segment. Disclaimer-
This photo was not taken by mt nor my camera, but was sent to
me by the captainand is therefore neither data, nor confidential

Reflecting back, I had quite a few individual noteworthy happenings that will stay with me. For one, as I mentioned previously, this is the harshest time of year. We fished N of St. Paul Island, which is high up in the Bering Sea, just a short ways S of the ice pack, with a consistent N wind. Bottom line being that it was cold- all of the time- just another hurdle to acclimate to. At times it was snowing sideways and felt like a blizzard. The visibility would be so poor, that it was somewhat difficult to see the fish as they came up on the line, as my eyes would be inclined to focus on all of the blindingly white snowflakes amid me and the fish. At night this would be amplified, as the LED light shining on the area would further illuminate the snow.

Occasionally on such days, it would be too rough and cold to sample, so I would sit in the wheelhouse and either talk with the captain/mate or just sit in silence, often mesmerized by the bright white snowflakes illuminated by the flood lamps, and violently travelling horizontally- it seemed the cold strong winds would never allow them to settle. In contrast, other nights it would snow, but with little to no wind. In these conditions, the snowflakes would just float in front of the wheelhouse windows, seemingly suspended before us and their black backdrop. One could get lost staring into this abyss as well, as it was highly reminiscent of space with its countless bright stars. It easily takes your mind elsewhere, this “winter wonderland” in the middle of the ocean.

Back Where I Started

It's been a great and much needed vacation, but now I am back where I started last April. I just finished my 4 day briefing here in Seattle, which was highly reminiscent of my 3 week training, but far less intense. It was a refresher course for those of us who hadn’t been in the Observing world for some time. I now, however, look at my training through a new lens, one that has been improved by experience that I have gained in the field observing on Kodiak Rockfish and Flatfish trawlers, as well as Cod on a pot boat out of Dutch Harbor. The material is less intimidating, and I can look at it more critically, and even offer the trainers advice in how to improve the manual and convey certain topics to us. On my most difficult assignment, I discovered that trying to go by the book was in my specific scenario, quite impossible. I recommended that a corollary detailing what to do in that case be added so that future observers will at least be more immediately aware of other options aside from what is currently shown.

Training aside, I am now almost a level 3 (of 7) and because of the experience I have gained on my pot vessel, I am now Lead Certified to work on longliners, which as the name implies, use long lines with hundreds of baited hooks to catch their fish. This comes with new experience, as well as a nice pay raise which I am quite pleased with. It is a very different sampling method compared to what I am used to. It requires me to be standing in one place exposed on deck for long periods of time tallying all of the species as they come up, and periodically collecting weight and specimen samples. It should be interesting this time of year, as the Bering is at its coldest. I am excited and nervous once again, as I was fresh out of training.

When the apartment is pretty empty, the list of things to do is short, and you are in wait mode for deployment, it can be a very de-motivating and even semi depressing environment. Sleeping in too late, eating breakfast at noon, buying some groceries, taking care of some business/job related things, eating dinner, then watching movies or reading until it’s time to go back to bed. Repeat. It puts you in a less than positive state of mind, at least for me. Some are just fine with it. I have in more recent years, added seeking out good places to hike to my list of hobbies, and have found it to be very satisfying. I did one of the only such hikes nearby today (Valentine’s Day), and it was just enough to lift my spirits and bring back some level of motivation. I am a firm believer in maximizing on my time and space, and when I feel that I am not accomplishing anything, it is a real downer for me. These hikes alleviate that feeling and take me back into my element, even if the trails are in an urban setting and are a little more traveled than I prefer.

On a different note, Seattle is a very wet place. I think our minds are wired to love water, aside from the fact that we need it to survive. Especially the sound of moving water in the many forms it takes; from the sound of the ocean repeatedly approaching and receding against a sand or pebble beach, the roar of a raging waterfall or river, trickle of a brook, lapping against the hull of a boat, or even the more familiar sound of it rushing through the plumbing pipes of our homes and hitting the walls of the shower. Few things, at least to me, are more soothing.