Settling Into the Coastal Pelagics Trawl Survey—Complete with Fish and Whales

Reuben Lasker Crew Getting it Done!

The entire crew of the Reuben Laskerhas been working hard to ensure the science is able to get done even in rougher seas. One of the first things I noticed was the work that goes into deploying and retrieving a net. I continue to be astonished with their work. It gets even more challenging when the seas get a little rougher and the wind picks up. It takes a lot of coordination between the officer driving the ship and the Chief Bosun on the back deck, who is in charge of deploying the trawl. While watching from the bridge, the Officer on Deck anticipates the deck's needs and makes corrections to the boat speed and direction as needed. Meanwhile, the deck crew ensures the net is properly lined up to fish efficiently-all while getting hit with waves. When retrieving the net, the deck crew ensures the net and lines are properly spooled, which requires a lot of tugging and pushing the net to get it in the right spot. It really is a sight to see!

Found the Fish

On our third or fourth night (I've honestly lost track), we caught some of the coastal pelagic specieswe are targeting. This leads to a whole new set of skills for me to learn. I've been trained on South Atlantic reef fish, which are much larger than even the biggest coastal pelagics here. Usually, otoliths-ear bones used to estimate fish age-of reef fish are much easier to find and extract than these little guys. On the flip side, even the larger pelagic fish here (less than 150 millimeters in length) have tiny otoliths that are harder to extract from the head and easier to lose. It takes a lot of practice and patience to learn the skill well. Another new skill out here is the use of electronic measuring boards. Instead of manually estimating fish lengths, this board uses a magnet to measure the fish's length and automatically uploads it to a computer. It saves a lot of time and is uploaded to a database shortly after completion.

Marine Mammal Watch

Each night, the trawl crew rotates jobs and I've found my favorite: marine mammal watch! This job entails watching the sea from the bridge for marine mammals. If seen, we would need to move from the area and trawl in a different location. Fortunately, we haven't seen any so far, so I get to enjoy the motion and sounds of the waves while getting fresh ocean air while on watch. If I'm lucky, one certain Officer on Deck is manning the helm while singing along to Spanish music that is piped through the speakers. It just adds to the experience!

Blue Whales!

When I first agreed to come on a West Coast cruise, I knew I would see a whole new suite of species, but I never expected to see whale spouts from a blue whale! One night, we were told of some whale spouts, but we could only see a few way off in the distance. The next morning, we were on the bridge helping to look for a passive acoustic mooring for retrieval when blue whales started swimming close enough to view from the bridge. Through binoculars, we could see parts of their bodies while they were diving! It was really exciting to see, even from a distance. Interestingly, we caught a ton of krill that night while trawling, which is a main source of food for whales. It was an absolute highlight to see (although digging through piles of krill to find anchovy-not as much!) Once we collected the samples we needed, the krill were returned to the sea.