After a good night’s sleep and some delicious breakfast, we headed down to False Bay for some field work. We got to learn about the importance of lugworms in their ecosystem. They aerate the sand to provide oxygen for other organisms in the same substrate. We also learned about different data collection techniques, such as using the quadrats (squares made of PVC pipes) to select the area that we want to study. We were divided into different groups. Some groups counted the number of burrows per quadrat, some groups collected sand samples, and other groups dug up burrows to check how many burrows had lugworms in them.

This is us learning about lugworms.

We also dug up a ghost shrimp!

After False Bay, we returned to the Spring Street International School laboratory to input our data into spreadsheets. We also learned about quality assurance/control, which is essential for accurate results.

Then we went on a brief excursion to the Friday Harbor Labs to identify the animals we dredged up when we went on the Centennial.

Identifying the mollusks and arthropods

Kaylee with cnidarians

Observing the injured Sea Urchin

Finally, we welcomed Professor Katie Dobkowski for dinner. She teaches Marine Biology at the University of Washington and specializes in bull kelp. In her presentation, she explained the process of the 40-year-old algae survey we will be conducting tomorrow. We’re very grateful for the opportunity to learn from Professor Dobkowski and can’t wait to work with her tomorrow!

-Magdalena, Clarissa, Eric, and Sabrina