2011

After a brutal introductory class, we took our first steps today in becoming marine biologists. Dr. Gruninger refreshed our memories as he overviewed the scientific method. Using his own experiments from his study at Texas A&M, Dr. Gruninger showed how he took a simple question about the natural world and turned it into a controlled, organized experiment which used data...

Today I woke up with one thing on my mind. This was the last day in paradise.. Today was all about service. We visited VISAR, which stands for Vigin Islands Search and Rescue. We arrived at the harbor and a pile of donuts awaited us. After taking down all the food in sight we all formed in the boat...

We started class today by talking about the schedule of our trip to the BVI and the expectations during it. Then we talked about leaping blennies. In its self I did not find the information in the article particlarly interesting; however, the discussion about evolution that stemmed from it was. We talked about evolution and how humans might have...

Ahhh, another day of marine biology. Today we began class by finishing our shark disection. After we finished we went back into the classroom to discuss last nights readings. This first reading was about porpises and their acoustic behavior in relation to hunting. What we learned and concluded is that the porpoises echolocating is similar to the large tooth...

Today was awesome! We woke up and went straight down the path where the taxis always pick us up and went straight to the marina for breakfast and to leave for the day. We left after breakfast for some scuba diving at the Wreck of the Rhone which was so cool! We went down a little deeper than sixty...

today I awoke in slightly better condition. Still had an earache, but it was tolerable. The group got in the taxi and then headed down to the harbor for our community service project with VISAR (virgin Island Search And Rescue). We had GINORMOUS donuts Fromm the vampire baker, they were delicious, and they chose the 5 tallest people (me...

Today we discussed ways to protect and conserve reefs through the use of native predators as "biocontrol." One example we mentioned were the groupers, which have been known to prey on invasive species such as lionfish. The only problem is that groupers are often overhunted; which means that they cannot significantly keep (and maybe even extirpate) lionfish populations in...

After a alarm clock malfunction, we awoke and organized our gear for the day. After a brief orientation session with the hotel's owner, we boded our taxi, Speedy's, for breakfast. We arrived at a beautiful hotel and were greeted by our four guides for the week. Sam, Andrew, Casey, and Jeff. They walked us through the program and highlighted...

To begin this weeks class we had different groups present different articles regarding marine life. The first article was about butterfly fish and their mass consumption of coral. The second article was about the massive decline of mollusks. Both of these readings really put into perspective the impacts that one small thing can have on the entire marine ecosystem....