Arrowtooth Flounder – NOAA Teacher at Sea Blog

August 18, 2011April 28, 2021

Caitlin Thompson: Bottom Trawl, August 11, 2011

NOAA Teacher at Sea
Caitlin Thompson
Aboard NOAA Ship Bell M. Shimada
August 1 — 14, 2011

Mission: Pacific Hake Survey
Geographical Area: Pacific Ocean off the Oregon and Washington Coasts
Date: August 12, 2011

Weather Data from the Bridge

Lat. 48 degrees 07.0 N
Long. 125 degrees 13.7 W
Present weather: partly cloudy 6/8
Visibility: 10 n.m.
Wind direction: 335
Speed 10 kts
Sea wave height: 2-3 feet
Swell waves – direction: —
Swell waves – height: —
Sea water temperature: 15.0 degrees C
Sea level pressure: 1017.3 mb
Temperature – dry bulb: 15.8 degrees C
Temperature – wet bulb: 13.2 degrees C

Science and Technology Log

The Third Wire FS70 provides an image of the net, shown as half circle, and the fish around it.

The big news is that we’re headed to port a day early. There was a electrical component failure in the engine system that converts the diesel power to electricity which powers the electrical motors that turn the propeller shaft. This reduced the Shimada to running on about half power. I can’t believe the cruise is ending!

Yesterday we did a bottom trawl, the first bottom trawl ever conducted on the Shimada. Using the sonars, the scientists on the sonar team saw an interesting aggregation of fish. They couldn’t use the usual mid-water net, which is relatively easy to damage, because the fish were very close to the bottom. Besides, the bottom appeared hard and rocky. I was excited when they decided to test the new net. Unlike the mid-water trawls, which usually bring up a mostly “clean” haul of hake, a bottom trawl tends to bring up a wide array of species. I wanted to learn some new names.

The ITI shows the distance of the bottom of the ocean from the net. Where the pink lines are highest, the net is lowest.

Deploying the bottom net proved educational. The mid-water net is sent down with the FS70 attached, which provides an image of the objects near and in the net. On the screen shot of the FS70 above and to the right, look for the half-circle, which shows the open net, the silver blue line under the net, which is the bottom of the ocean, and some dots inside the net that are most likely fish already caught in the net. The images are sent through a wire. It would be too easy to damage the wire in a bottom trawl, so the scientists use the ITI instead.

Larry was in charge of fishing today and was disatisfied with the image the ITI System produced of the bottom trawl. The ITI does not produce as good an image of the bottom trawl as the FS 70 did on the midwater trawl. This made it more difficult to decide how much was being caught and how long to fish. The scientists began planning how to get a better system for the ship.

The bottom trawl disappointed the scientists because it brought up fewer hake than they had hoped, but I was happy to see so many new kinds of fish, and to learn to identify many so that I could help sort. This is the list of everything we pulled up:

Ratfish — This spotted ratfish has a venomous spine on its dorsel fin!

Aspot prawn, full of eggs — A spot prawn, full of eggs

Arrowtooth flounder
Brown cat shark egg case
Cloud sponges
Darkblotched rockfish
Dover sole
Greenstriped rockfish
Hermit crab unident.
Lanternfish unident.
Long honred decorator crab
Longnose skate
Pacific hake
Pacific ocean perch
Pom pom anemonome
Redbanded rockfish
Rex sole
Rosethorn rockfish
Sablefish
Sea cucumber unident.
Sea urchins and sand dollars unident.
Sharpchin rockfish
Shortspine thornyhead
Skate egg case ulnident.
Slender sole
Snail unident.
Spot prawn
Spotted ratfish
Wattled eelpout

Personal Log

Last night, some of us went up to the fly bridge in hopes of seeing the Perseid Meteor Shower. The sky was miraculously clear but the nearly full moon and bright lights on the ship blocked out most of the stars. Still, we saw some truly magnificent shooting stars before the clouds rolled in. I had brought my sleeping bag for warmth and fell fast asleep to the soothing voices of my shipmates. When they woke me up, I dropped by the chemistry lab to see how the nighttime zooplankton sampling was going and discovered that a mallard had arrived on deck. Mallards are not sea birds and are not equipped to be so far out to sea, so we were highly surprised to see her some fifty nautical miles off land. We named her Myrtle. We gave Myrtle food and water and hoped she would stay with the ship until we were close to land, but after a long nap, she took off. I hope she makes it to land.

In cribbage news, I won the semi-finals but lost the championship game. I had such a great time playing.

June 24, 2011April 28, 2021

Jason Moeller: June 21-22, 2011

NOAA TEACHER AT SEA
JASON MOELLER
ONBOARD NOAA SHIP OSCAR DYSON
JUNE 11 – JUNE 30, 2011

NOAA Teacher at Sea: Jason Moeller
Ship: Oscar Dyson
Mission: Walleye Pollock Survey
Geographic Location: Gulf of Alaska
Dates: June 21-22, 2011

Ship Data
Latitude: 55.03N
Longitude: -163.08W
Wind: 17.81 knots
Surface Water Temperature: 6.7 degrees celsius
Air Temperature: 10.10 degrees celsius
Humidity: 85%
Depth: 82.03 meters

Personal Log
Welcome back, explorers!

June 21
Today has been the calmest evening since I boarded the Oscar Dyson. The night shift did not fish at all, which meant that I basically had an evening off! Even the evenings we have fished have been relatively calm. It takes us about an hour to an hour and a half to process a haul of fish, and up to this point we average about one haul per night. That gives me quite a bit of down time! When I am on shift, that down time is usually spent in one of two places.

The first spot is the computer lab in the acoustics room. This is the room where we wait for the haul to be brought in. I write the logs, lesson plan, check emails, and surf the web during quiet times.

This is the lounge. The cabinet under the TV has over 500 movies, and a movie is usually playing when I walk in. Behind the couch is a large bookshelf with several hundred books, so I have done a fair amount of pleasure reading as well.

When I am not sitting in one of these two places, I am usually running around the ship with my camera taking nature photos. Below are the best nature photos of the past three days.

Volcano — One of the coolest things about the Aleutian islands has to be the number of volcanoes that can be seen. This is the one on Unimak Island.

volcano2 — A second picture of the same volcano.

This is just a cool rock formation off of the coast. The Oscar Dyson has been hugging the coast the entire trip, which has been great for scenery.

A gull skims the water by the Oscar Dyson.

gull2 — A gull wings toward the Oscar Dyson

June 22
We resumed fishing today! These trawls brought in quite a few species that I had not seen before, along with the ever plentiful pollock.

Jason by belt — Jason waits for the net to load the fish onto the conveyor belt.

Jason with flounder — Here, I am separating the arrowtooth flounder from the pollock.

We managed to catch a skate in the net! Skates are very close relatives to sharks. We quickly measured it and then released it into the ocean.

skate 2 — A second photograph of the skate.

Do you remember the little lumpsucker from a few posts back? This is what an adult looks like!

lumpsucker2 — The lumpsucker was slimy! I tried to pick it up with my bare hands, and the slime gummed up my hands so that I couldn't pick it up! Even with gloves designed for gripping fish I had trouble holding on.

lumpsucker3 — A closeup of the lumpsucker

I finally saw a crab! None of us know what was attached to it, but the scientists believe that it was an anemone.

Science and Technology Log
There is no Science and Technology Log with this post.

Species Seen
Humpback Whales
Northern Fulmar
Gulls
Rockfish
Walleye Pollock
Lumpsucker
Arrowtooth Flounder
Atka Makerel
Salmon
Sculpin
Copepods
Isopods
Skate
Crab!!!

Reader Question(s) of the Day!

Today’s question comes from James and David Segrest, who are two of my homeschool students!

Q. What do you eat while you are on your adventures? Do you get to catch and eat fish?

The food is great! Our chef has a degree in culinary arts, and has made some amazing meals!

I wake up at 2:30 pm for my 4 pm to 4 am night shift, and usually start my day with a small bowl of oatmeal and a toasted bagel. At 5 pm, about two hours after breakfast, dinner is served, and I will eat a huge meal then too. Every meal has two main courses, a vegetable, a bread, and dessert. We have had a wide variety of main courses which have included bratwurst, steak, gumbo with king crab, fish, chicken parmesan, spaghetti with meatballs, and others!

We will often eat some of the fish we catch, usually salmon and rockfish since those provide the best eating. The salmon disappears to the kitchen so quickly that I have not actually been able to get a photo of one! We have not caught a halibut in the trawl net yet, otherwise we would likely have eaten that as well. Yum! We have not yet eaten pollock, as it is viewed as being a much lower quality fish compared with the rockfish and salmon.

I’m out of questions, so please email me at jmoeller@knoxville-zoo.org with those questions please!

June 21, 2011April 28, 2021

Jason Moeller: June 19-20, 2011

NOAA TEACHER AT SEA
JASON MOELLER
ONBOARD NOAA SHIP OSCAR DYSON
JUNE 11 – JUNE 30, 2011

NOAA Teacher at Sea: Jason Moeller
Ship: Oscar Dyson
Mission: Walleye Pollock Survey
Geographic Location: Gulf of Alaska
Dates: June 19-20, 2011

Ship Data
Latitude: 54.29 N
Longitude: -165.13 W
Wind: 12.31 knots
Surface Water Temperature: 5.5 degrees Celsius
Air Temperature: 6.1 degrees Celsius
Humidity: 97%
Depth: 140.99 meters

Personal Log

Welcome aboard, explorers!

To be honest, there is not a great deal to write about for the personal log. My daily schedule has settled in quite nicely! I get off work at 4 in the morning, shower, sleep until 2:30 in the afternoon, and then head down to the acoustics room where we track the fish. When we are processing a catch (see the science and technology section of this blog), I am in the fish lab wearing bright orange waterproof clothes that make me resemble a traffic cone.

The rest of the time is down time, which is spent reading, working on the blog, learning about the ship, and dreaming up lesson plans that I can use to torment my students. I hope they are interested in a summer fishing trip, as that is the one I am currently planning.

Most of the blog work involves running around and taking photographs. My wife’s camera was soaked beyond repair during the prank that was pulled (see the previous post) as Sarah was holding the camera when the wave came over the railing. Fortunately, there was another camera on board.

Our survey is keeping us very close to the coast and islands of Alaska. As a result, I’ve gotten some gorgeous photos. This place is just beautiful.

Wind — Jason in front of an island. It was a bit windy, but at least it was sunny!

view — Mountaintops visible just above the island coast. Jake took this photo while I was in the fish lab.

Science and Technology Log

We finally started fishing! As I mentioned in my very first blog, the Oscar Dyson is surveying walleye pollock, which is an important fish species here in Alaska. Walleye pollock make up 56.3% of the groundfish catch in Alaska, and is eaten in fast food restaurants around the world such as Wendy’s, McDonalds, and Burger King. It is also used to make imitation crabmeat.

Our first catch had a little over 300 walleye pollock, and we processed all of them. Three hundred is an ideal sample size for this species. If, for example, we had caught 2,000 pollock, we would only have processed 300 of the fish, and we would have released the rest of them back into the ocean.

The photo captions below will provide a tour of the fish lab as well as introduce blog readers to the data we wish to collect and how scientists aboard the Oscar Dyson collect it.

Conveyer belt — This is the conveyor belt. After the catch is pulled on board, it is loaded onto this conveyor belt and moved down the belt and into the lab. At this point, the scientists separate the pollock from the rest of the sea life that was accidentally in the net. Today, the majority of the "extra" sea life were brittle stars, sponges, and a few squid.

Gender Box — Once the pollock and other sea life are separated, they are moved to this box to be sexed. In order to do this, we would have to cut the fish open and look at the internal organs of the fish. Once this was done, females would go over the yellow sign on the right and into the box that was hidden behind it. The males went into the box on the left.

Length Station — Once we had determined the pollock's gender, we moved to the measuring station, which was on the other side of the last station. We laid each individual fish on the table on top of the ruler, and then measured the fish from the head to the fork of its tail. We recorded the length by tapping the table at the fork of the fish's tail with a sensor that we carried in our hand. A sensor in the table recorded the data and sent it to the computer monitor seen above the table.

measuring pollock — Jason measures a pollock on the board!

From this catch (we will do this for any following catch as well) we also took and preserved twenty stomachs from random fish. This was done in order to later analyze what the pollock had eaten before they died. We also took forty otoliths from random pollock as well. An otolith is the ear bone of the pollock, and it is incredibly important to researchers as they will tell the pollock’s age in a similar manner to the way a tree’s rings will.

Stored Otoliths — After removing the otolith from the fish, they were put into these vials. Each pair of otoliths received their own vial.

While looking at pollock is the main focus of the survey, we did run into some other neat critters in this haul as well!

Atka Makerel — This is an Atka Mackerel. We also caught a salmon, but I didn't get a good look at it. Our kitchen grabbed it!

Basket Star — This is a basket starfish. We were trawling close to the bottom and pulled it up in the nets.

Arrowtooth Flounder — This is an arrowtooth flounder. These are not very good eating fish, and are not the flounder found in the supermarket. Check out the nasty teeth in the photo below this one!

Flounder teeth — I wouldn't want to be bitten by this fish!

Species Seen

Albatross
Northern Fulmar
Gulls
Rockfish
Walleye Pollock
Lumpsucker
Arrowtooth Flounder
Atka Mackerel
Salmon
Pacific Grenadier
Squid
Shrimp
Basket Starfish

Reader Question(s) of the Day!

Today’s question is actually a request. It comes from Tish Neilson, one of our homeschool parents.

Hey Jason –
I had a super favor to ask of you. There is a little girl from Jackson’s school that is a 5th grader and she was recently diagnosed with leukemia. There have been some bracelets created for her that say “Going Bananas for Anna” to show support and several moms and I have gotten together and are putting together a scrapbook for her and trying to get as many people as possible wearing her bracelets in really cool places. Then we are having them take pictures to send to us to put in her scrapbook so she can she how far her bracelets have traveled and how many people are pulling for her. If it’s possible to do so and you would be willing to do it I would LOVE to try and get you a bracelet to take some pictures and send to me from Alaska. Her nickname is Anna Banana and she is always asking for pictures and such so that is why we came up with this idea.
Tish Neilson

Unfortunately, I had left for Alaska before I received the email, and as a result I do not have a bracelet. Hopefully, a sign will work just as well.

For Anna — Hi Anna! This is Unimak Island! It is one of the Aleutian Islands off the coast of Alaska! Hang in there, we are rooting for you!

June 21, 2011April 28, 2021

Tammy Orilio, My First Pollock Trawl, June 20, 2011

NOAA Teacher at Sea: Tammy Orilio

NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson

Mission: Pollock Survey

Geographical Area of Cruise: Gulf of Alaska

Date: 20 June 2011

Weather Data from the Bridge:

Latitude: 54.29 N

Longitude: -165.13 W

Wind Speed: 12.31 knots

Surface Water Temp: 5.5 degrees C

Water Depth: 140.99 m

Air Temp: 6.1 degrees C

Relative Humidity: 97%

Science & Technology Log: walleye pollock, which is an important fish species here in Alaska. Walleye pollock make up 56.3% of the groundfish catch in Alaska (http://www.afsc.noaa.gov/species/pollock.php), and chances are you’ve eaten it before. It’s a commonly used fish in all of the fast food restaurants, in fish sticks, and it’s also used to make imitation crab meat.

At the sexing station, cutting open pollack.

We also removed and preserved 20 stomachs from randomly selected fish in order to (later) analyze what they had been eating prior to them being caught. One of the last things we do is collect otoliths from each of those 20 fish. Otoliths are ear bones, and they are used to determine the age of a fish- they have rings, similar to what you see in trees.

Here’s a look at some of the bycatch in our nets:

Basket Star. Marine 1: What phylum are sea stars in?

The reason(s) WHY they're called ARROWTOOTH flounder. — The reason(s) WHY they’re called ARROWTOOTH flounder.

Animals Spotted:

walleye pollock

chum salmon

rockfish

arrowtooth flounder

squid

basket star

Northern Fulmars

Gulls

Albatross (couldn’t tell what kind)

* I did spot some kind of pinniped yesterday, but have no idea what exactly it was!

Personal Log:

I was very excited that we finally got to fish today!! As an added bonus, we caught 2 salmon in the trawl, which means we’re having salmon for dinner tonight! We we supposed the have teriyaki steak, but the cook has changed it to teriyaki salmon instead 🙂 I didn’t get any pics of them because my gloves were covered in fish scales, blood, and guts by that point and I didn’t want to get any of that funk on my camera 🙂
We passed by Dutch Harbor yesterday- it should sound familiar if you watch Deadliest Catch. We didn’t go into the Harbor, so no, I didn’t see any of the crab boats or any of the guys from the show! Below are some pics of the Aleutian Islands that I’ve see thus far…many more to come, since we still have another 13 days (give or take) of sailing left!

QUESTION(S) OF THE DAY:

The Aleutian Islands were formed at the boundary where the North American and Pacific Plates are coming together. The Pacific Plate is denser than the North American Plate, so it slides underneath the North American Plate. What is this type of plate boundary called (where plates move towards each other), and what is it called when one plate slides underneath another?
One thing we’re doing on this trip is trawling for fish. We are conducting both mid-water and bottom trawls. Describe one advantage and one disadvantage to trawling in order to gather scientific data.

September 16, 2010April 22, 2021

Thomas Ward, September 16, 2010

NOAA Teacher At Sea: Thomas Ward
Aboard NOAA Ship Miller Freeman

Mission: Fisheries Surveys
Geographical Area of Cruise: Eastern Bering Sea
Date: September 16, 2010

Question and Answer for the Teacher at Sea (NOAA)

Let’s jump right in, and not into the Bering Sea, it is too cold.

We have not seen any NOAA buoys, or at least I have not. NOAA does maintain numerous buoys but our mission aboard the Miller Freeman is strictly biological, juvenile flat fish to be specific. The types of little fish that we have caught and persevered for further study (remember the freezer) are; Yellowfin Sole, Pacific Halibut, Northern Rock Sole, Flathead Sole, Alaska Plaice, Arrowtooth Flounder, Kamchatka Flounder Greenland Turbot, and larvae of Long Head Dab. These fish that are being saved are relatively small, about 1-3 inches long, they are juveniles. The scientists are trying to determine the mechanism that controls the development of these juveniles into adults. I was also happy to learn that the scientists that are doing the sampling are also the same scientists that are going to be doing the work back in the lab. The identification of these youngsters seems to be effortless by the group of scientists I am working with, they really know their stuff. I have not seen too many ships here while we are out to sea. Last night I did see a light in the distance and assumed it was another ship but did not confirm it with the bridge. We do not fish to catch food for us on board. In fact there are so many regulations regarding fishing that we just focus on the mission and let the cooks in the galley do what they do, and let me tell you it is good. We often do get a glimpse of land, the pictures of the volcanoes on previous blogs are taken from our ship.

This video shows me measuring flat fish on the magnetic measuring board that I mentioned in an earlier blog. After imputing the species and other pertinent data, on a touch screen monitor, the fish is laid on the board and a device is touched to the board where the tail is. The length of the fish is recorded electronically. The fish that you see in the video are adults of the juveniles related to this FOCI Research Project and we still gather quantitative data on them. After we catalog them they are returned to the ocean where they have a very good chance of surviving. Keep those questions coming.

June 18, 2010March 12, 2021

Richard Chewning, June 18th, 2010

NOAA Teacher at Sea
Richard Chewning
Onboard NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson
June 4 – 24, 2010

NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson
Mission: Pollock Survey
Geographical area of cruise: Gulf of Alaska (Kodiak) to eastern Bering Sea (Dutch Harbor)
Date: June 18, 2010

Weather Data from the Bridge

Position: Bering Sea, north of Dutch Harbor
Time: 1600 hours
Latitude: N 55 06.120
Longitude: W 166 33.450
Cloud Cover: Mostly cloudy
Wind: 10 knots from the west
Temperature: 7.1 C
Barometric Pressure: 1010.8

Science and Technology Log

In order to manage a public resource such as pollock, fisheries managers must develop a stock assessment. A stock assessment is a big picture overview of a certain population of fish. Fisheries managers use stock assessments to determine opening and closing dates for fishing seasons, catch limits (the number of fish that can be caught by a particular fisherman or boat), and the total allowable catch for the season. Stock assessments are developed from a combination of fishery dependant and independent data. Fishery dependant data includes catch records from commercial fishing boats and reports from processors dockside that prepare and package the fish for market. Combined with this information is fishery independent data. This information is gathered from sources not involved with commercial fishing.

chewning_log8_img_1 — Cod end filled with pollock

chewning_log8_img_3 — Unsorted catch entering wet lab

The Dyson’s acoustic trawl survey is one of the primary sources of fishery independent data for the pollock stock assessment. The Dyson’s transducers provide a wealth of acoustic data from each transect. These acoustic returns must first be identified or deciphered before being used in the stock assessment. Just like you need a key to decode the symbols on a road map or need a scale to interpret the colors on a weather map, the acoustic returns also need to be referenced with actual pollock specimens collected by trawling. By matching up the characteristics of the fish caught in the trawl with their acoustic returns, researchers can interpret all the acoustic data from the entire survey area.

chewning_log8_img_4 — My what sharp teeth you have! Arrowtooth flounder

Pollock specimens are collected with Aleutian wing trawls, or AWTs for short. An Aleutian wing trawl is a single large net deployed off the stern of the Dyson. Large metal fishbuster doors are used to open the mouth of the net in the water. The catch is collected in a bag located at the end of the net called the cod end. The cod end’s mesh size prevents anything larger than 0.5 inches from escaping. Once the net is hauled back on deck, the cod end is emptied in the wet lab, and the entire catch is sorted. Fish are identified, counted, weighed, and measured. The gender and maturity of a subsample of pollock are also recorded. Stomachs are collected to determine what the pollock are eating. Finally, otoliths, the ear bones of fish, are collected. Just like counting the rings of a tree, researchers will count the number of rings in the otolith to determine the age of the pollock. Notable bycatch (fish that were not targeted) include eulachon, arrowtooth flounder, Pacific cod, sturgeon poacher, and yellowfin sole. Misha told me Russians used to dry out eulachon whole and use them as candles because of their high oil content. In fact I learned that one of common names in the US for eulachon is candlefish!

Why gather so much information on a single species of fish like pollock? Fisheries managers are responsible for the sustainable use of public resources. Without careful monitoring, fishing pressure, natural predation, and disease might remove pollock from the population faster than they can replace themselves. There is great demand for pollock both commercially and in the Bering Sea ecosystem. Walleye pollock is the largest US fishery by volume and third largest by value. Annual US catches can average 2.5 billion pounds. Pollock is also an important food source for Stellar sea lion, other marine mammals, birds, and other fish.

chewning_log8_img_8 — The Dyson in Dutch Harbor

Personal Log

On Thursday, I had the pleasure of joining two members of the deck crew, Joel Kellogg and Glen Whitney, to pick up a new addition of the science party in Dutch Harbor. Mike Sigler, a fish biologist with NOAA, is a project leader and principal investigator with the North Pacific Research Board’s Bering Sea Integrated Ecosystem Research Program (BSIERP). He is joining the Dyson for the last week of our survey. BSIERP is a six year long collaborative study with the National Science Foundation’s Bering Ecosystem Study (BEST). More than a hundred scientists from these two groups are investigating the organisms and physical forces that make up and influence life in the Bering Sea ecosystem.

chewning_log8_img_9 — Recovering the Peggy D.

To pick up Mike, the Dyson launched the Peggy D. Named for wife of Oscar Dyson, the Peggy D. is a small power boat used to ferry people to and from shore. Peggy Dyson is a famous Alaskan in her own right, serving as a National Weather Service ship to shore weather broadcaster. Her voice brought vital information and reassurance to Alaskan fisherman. She diligently performed these duties twice a day, seven days a week for 25 years. I really enjoyed having the opportunity to see the Dyson from the water as my only vantage point for the last two weeks has been from the Dyson looking out. I was surprised how quickly the Dyson shrunk on the horizon as we sped away and traveled into Dutch Harbor. Dutch Harbor felt like a true frontier town. The vehicles seemed to reflect the character of the town. While looking rough and weathered on the outside, the beat-up cars and trucks of Dutch Harbor revealed a resilience and gritty determination to keep moving forward and press on against an unforgiving environment. I loved hearing the cry of the bald eagles that were spotted everywhere you looked. While I enjoyed having solid ground under my feet for a few short minutes, I appreciated the sense of familiarity and belonging I felt upon returning to the Dyson.

chewning_log8_img_7 — Scute visits the Bering Sea

Scute, the Georgia Sea Turtle Center Mascot, was spotted visiting the Bering Sea today! Scute, a loggerhead sea turtle, travels the world promoting awareness of sea turtles. We know Scute was only visiting the Bering Sea as these waters are too cold for loggerhead sea turtles. Loggerhead sea turtles are the most abundant sea turtles in US coastal waters. Scute’s home is the Georgia Sea Turtle Center (GSTC) located on Jekyll Island, Georgia. The GSTC is a research, rehabilitation, and education center dedicated to helping sea turtles along the GA coast and around the world. Sea turtles released from the GSTC will often have a satellite transmitter attached to their shell just like Scute. The transmitters allow researchers to track their movements at sea. Only one of the seven species of sea turtles found worldwide can survive this far north – the leatherback sea turtle. The leatherback sea turtle is the largest species of sea turtle reaching six and a half feet in length and weighing as much as 2000 pounds! Leatherbacks have several adaptations such as high oil content in their large bodies that help them tolerate the cold waters of the southern Bering Sea. Leatherback sea turtles feed on jellyfish and can dive to great depths because the protection provided by their leathery shell (a hard shell would crack under the high pressure of the water). For more information about Scute and sea turtles, check out the GSTC website at http://www.georgiaseaturtlecenter.org !