Day 9 - "Live from the Field"

It is the intention of my involvement in the Earthwatch Expedition to be able to provide my students the opportunity to learn first hand with me as I experience the field study project with Monterey Marine mammals. The daily blog is a concise narration for them to follow me in the field. We have arranged conferences using our computer eye cams, mic, and audio. When the technology and internet is cooperative, it has been an exciting and engaging interaction.
Upon my return to school next week, I hope to be able to further our project with conservation projects and stewardship in our community. I will create new lesson plans and curriculum for further study with marine mammals.
Sadly, today was our last field study with the sea otters. We observed their raft behaviors when they are together; for example, their social interaction, play, rest, grooming, travel, and foraging (eating). We updated our observations every five minutes with these behavioral changes. We also noted their movements of exiting and entering the channel. In order to cover all times of day with our observations, we arrived at sunrise – despite today being daylight savings time! Two days ago, we observed through sunset, when we could no longer see them.
Following our observations, we did a beach clean-up and I stumbled upon a common murre; a sea bird that often spends most of its time at sea. The murre is a northern counterpart of the penguin, in the auks family. He was unable to fly or move, but quite alive and breathing. I recognized his condition similar to what I saw in brown pelicans with demoic acid poisoning which temporaily paralyzes their movement and ability to fly; they can literally drop from the sky. We called the Department of Fish and Game dispatch which is open 24 hours a day; and the SPCA came two hours later to pick him up from us. Hopefully, he can be treated in time if his condition is a result of demoic acid.


Anna Janovicz, our fearless Earthwatch team leader