A pillow woke me up today…from Gavin. Luckily, he woke all of us up when he did, because we almost overslept. We at breakfast at the office again, eating donuts, pop-tarts, and yogurt. During breakfast, Doctor Shannon Gore gave a presentation on sea turtles and the different kinds. It started to pour near the end of the presentation, and we had to wait to leave for a little while. Afterwards, the classes split up, with Marine Biology 1 heading to Savannah Bay. Caitlin and Laura were there waiting for us, and explained to us the attributes of invertebrates and how to identify them. After that, we went out for a 45 minute snorkel, finding lots of invertebrates and even a lobster. Laura headed out with us and took photos of the group underwater and of the creatures we found. Caitlin and Laura started to collect invertebrates to bring back to the shore, and once we got to shore we identified the species with the help of a fish book. Once we were done and packing up, it started to rain again, with some of us heading back into the water because it was warmer. We started to play Marco-Polo while waiting for the rain to pass. Afterwards we headed to the docks to eat, and after we finished our burgers we headed out to catch turtles to tag. The turtle tagging method we used was called manti tow, which required the people catching the turtles to hold on to a life preserver connected to the back of the boat while it was moving through the water. We looked (and felt) like shark bait. I mean, other than being pulled through a field of jellyfish, it was really fun! 20 minutes into the first shift, Nick Byrne found a turtle and followed it, with the first shift following him and the second shift waiting for the boat to pull near Nick to jump in. This is the moment Jackson White became a man. White went down about 30 feet behind the turtle and he… picked up the turtle. No resistance, no darting off, nothing. Really anti-climactic, I know. After pulling the turtle on the boat, we tagged him and let him back into the water. Shift two got into the water and White found another turtle immediately and while everyone was expecting the second coming, he lost sight of the turtle. Soon after, the line got stuck in the propeller, so we dropped anchor and pleasure snorkeled for a bit. 20 minutes later, we headed back to the docks and headed back to the showers. We ate dinner at Mad Dogs again, and tonight it was lasagna. It was very good, and now I am currently writing this blog post. I’ll be passing out tonight, I’m really tired and we have a two tank dive tomorrow. Good night!
