Germaine Thomas: Big Boats and Little Boats and How They Fish Differently, August 10, 2023

NOAA Teacher at Sea

Germaine Thomas (she/her)

Aboard NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson

August 7 – August 21, 2023

Mission: Acoustic Trawl Survey (Leg 3 of 3)
Geographic Area of Cruise: Pacific Ocean/ Gulf of Alaska
Date: Friday, August 10, 2023

Weather Data
Lat 59.47 N, Lon 149.36 W
Sky condition: Cloudy and rain
Wind Speed: 23.73 knots
Wind Direction: 72.22°
Air Temp: 14.47 °C

Science Log

Comparing Set Netting to Trawling

There are many different ways to catch fish. I am comparing set netting, in a little boat, a 24 ft. skiff to trawling on NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson, a big boat which is 208 ft. This is a little bit like comparing apples to oranges; set netting and trawling are different gear types used to catch fish very differently. Set netting targets mostly salmon, while trawling in Alaska targets mostly pollock. Both of these methods of fishing can be used by scientists to collect samples and to catch fish commercially to sell in global markets.

Set Netting:

I am a commercial set netter, which uses a gill net, specifically designed to catch salmon by the gills. Salmon will swim along the shoreline. Set netters place their nets perpendicular to the shore so salmon have to swim around the nets or try to swim through them. When they try to swim through the fish get caught by the gills. Watch the video below on how I pull the net in using a hydraulic roller and pick fish out.

Pulling in the net and picking a Sockeye salmon

[Transcript: Yup, here I am, picking a… Sockeye salmon! Yup, here it is, a beautiful, lovely, amazing Sockeye salmon that I picked. This is what I do in the summer! Yeah!]

When you watch the video you will see the net is a light color that matches the water. Again, salmon do not see the net and try to swim through it and then they are caught. At the end of the video I place the fish in a brailer bag filled with ice and sea water to keep the fish cool. The better the fish are cared for, the better the product that goes to market.

Trawling

Unlike set netting, which is done on a small skiff with just a few people, trawling is done on a large boat with a big crew. The Oscar Dyson has the ability to use echo-sounders to find out where fish are, and then they can lower a trawl net into the water specifically sampling at that depth for fish. A trawl net is like a big bag with are large opening that funnels fish into it.

The Scientists on NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson use a much smaller net than a commercial trawler does to catch fish. They compare what they see on their echo-sounders to what is caught in their net. They use this information to get a general idea of what kind of fish are present in a specific part of the ocean they are sampling. This helps scientists provide accurate information to both the federal and state government to help manage fisheries and keep intact healthy populations of fish.

A commercial trawler will try to catch a specific kind of fish, their target species. If they catch fish other than their target species this is known as bycatch. Large commercial trawlers can have nets up to 50 meters in length, so they can catch a lot of fish. They can only keep and sell their target species. The fish that the Oscar Dyson catches cannot be sold or eaten, but the data the collection provides scientists a great deal about what kind of fish, approximately how many, and at what stages of reproductive development, are located in specific areas of the ocean.

How trawling can impact salmon fisheries like set netting:

Knowing what is happening in a different part of the ocean is very important to other fisheries. Salmon initially develop in fresh water lakes or rivers and then migrate to the ocean. They spend most of their adult life migrating large distances in the ocean, and they depend on food that is present out where the trawlers are fishing. They also may be caught by trawlers as bycatch.

Below is a short sped up video of crew members retrieving a trawl net.

Crewmembers aboard NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson retrieve a trawl net. [No audible dialogue.]

In Alaska there is a bit of controversy over one gear type taking away fish from other gear types. Specifically there is concern about commercial trawling, picking up non-target species like salmon from local coastal fisheries and subsistence users. A lot of the answers may exist in the data that the science team is collecting.

Personal Log

At the beginning of the blog in the weather report you will notice that the wind speed is pretty high at 23.72 knots. A gale is heading towards our area in the Gulf of Alaska. We are finishing a transect line and then heading into a protected bay in the Kenai Peninsula to wait out the weather. While the ship is protected, the science team will work on recalibrating the echo-sounders below the ship. The science team has been experiencing a bit of unexplained noise in one of their lower frequencies. Hopefully, the opportunity to do this calibration will help.

Crew Member in the Spotlight

The Oscar Dyson has a science team and a crew that work together to collect the data for the acoustic trawl sampling and run the ship. Working for NOAA can provide exciting opportunities for young people to experience life on the ocean. When you are on board the ship, you have free lodging and food, which on this leg of the cruise is quite excellent, so you can save money while on board. So far everyone I met enjoys their job and is willing to let me ask them questions about how they got here.

Dee with a picture of the Oscar Dyson in the background

Meet Elvricka “Dee” Daniels from Jacksonville, Florida. She has been on NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson for about 2 months. She was originally temping for an agency in Florida when a friend told her about a subcontractor for NOAA, Keystone. She is currently working as a deckhand for the contractor Keystone.

What does she enjoy aboard the ship?

“Fishing! What kind of different fish come in the trawl net. There is always something different every time we fish.”

She also really likes being on whale watch on the bridge. The science team cannot set out the net if there are whales in the area, so there is always a crew member looking for whales.

As a high school teacher, I like to ask people what their school experience was like. Everyone has a different experience in high school some good some, perhaps not so good, but many go on be successful adults. What was high school like for Dee?

“It was good at first and then it got bad. I made poor choices that impacted my life, I had to go to summer school to make up for missed school. Doing well in school is very important to my family.”

So now here she is out in the Gulf of Alaska helping science happen and impacting others by what she does.

August 10, 2023August 10, 2023

Germaine Thomas: Meet the Teacher at Sea on NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson, August 9, 2023

NOAA Teacher at Sea

Germaine Thomas (she/her)

Aboard NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson

August 7 – August 21, 2023

Mission: Acoustic Trawl Survey (Leg 3 of 3)
Geographic Area of Cruise: Pacific Ocean/ Gulf of Alaska
Date: Wednesday, August 9, 2023

Weather Data
Lat 58.16 N, Lon 148.97 W
Sky condition: Cloudy
Wind Speed: 2.88 knots
Wind Direction: 301.28°
Air Temp: 12.44 °C

Personal Log

School will soon be starting in Anchorage at Bettye Davis East High School. I will not be in school for the first three days because I am having fun on a teacher’s field trip. Good things come to those who apply for it. I applied and got accepted on this cruise before the pandemic, but life and safety concerns made my journey about three years longer. Finally, I am living the dream and out in the Gulf of Alaska surrounded by pure ocean, whales, seabirds and catching lots of fish.

selfie of Germaine on a kayak (too close to see the kayak, but we can see she's surrounded by water, with some forested shoreline beyond.) she wears a life jacket, sunglasses, baseball cap. A small white dog peers over her left shoulder. — Kayaking in Prince William Sound with Loki the dog. My family commercial fishes for Sockeye Salmon in Main Bay.

My name is Germaine Myerchin Thomas. I was born and raised in Ketchikan Alaska. I am the daughter of a fishermen and a teacher. I, myself, am a teacher, and I commercial fish in Prince William Sound. So far I have spent most of my summer fishing in the Eshamy district about 45 miles outside of Whittier. It has been a cold dark wet summer( the word “summer” is debatable). Recently, I jumped from Set Net fishing for Sockeye (Red) Salmon, in small open skiffs, to the fabulous NOAAS Oscar Dyson.

Just visualize the ice sculptures, swimming pool and yoga studio on the Lido Deck… nope! The NOAAS Oscar Dyson is a research vessel that you can find more about by clicking the link above. Currently there are 24 crew members and 8 scientists. The ship is outfitted to conduct an acoustic trawl survey, but there are other scientific projects going on during this leg of the cruise. It, also has great food and two gyms. The waves rolling under the hull of the boat make the feel of gravity extra strong while trying to do push ups.

Already I have discovered that working out in the ocean requires being very flexible and adaptable. Sometimes the weather or wildlife can delay setting out the trawl net. Last night the boat was surrounded by whales (Fin and Sei), marine birds (Fulmars, Shearwaters and Black footed Albatross) all enjoying the abundant fish that we wanted to catch in our trawl net. Naturally we just let the animals enjoy the abundance while the scientist patiently waited for their turn in another area.

When the cruise ends I will head back to Anchorage and teach high school, chemistry, oceanography, and marine biology. I am really looking forward to meeting my students for the first time. I hope that I might be able to Zoom into my classroom and share what I am doing while I am out here.

August 9, 2023August 10, 2023

Germaine Thomas: The Adventure Begins Aboard NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson, August 7, 2023

NOAA Teacher at Sea

Germaine Thomas (she/her)

Aboard NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson

August 7 – August 21, 2023

Mission: Acoustic Trawl Survey (Leg 3 of 3)
Geographic Area of Cruise: Pacific Ocean/ Gulf of Alaska
Date: Monday August 7, 2023

Weather Data
Lat 58.31 N, Lon 151.58 W
Sky condition: cloudy
Wind Speed: 12.43 knots
Wind Direction: 357.55°
Sea Wave height: 1 ft | Swell: 340°, 1-2 ft
Air Temp: 12.35 °C

Science log

The purpose of this trip is acoustic trawl sampling for pollock (Gadus chalchogrammus). There are other projects that people are working on during this leg that I will report on in other upcoming blogs.

Today, at about 5:30 pm we deployed a CTD (Conductivity, Temperature and Depth – Probe). This probe measures the salinity using conductivity, the temperature with a digital thermometer, and records the data all at different depths in the water column. This CTD also records fluorescence which is an easy way to determine the amount of plankton present. The plankton at the surface are producers and have chlorophyll, which reacts to fluorescence and can be recorded. This information will be important when we start taking trawl samples, so the ships crew will routinely send out the CTD while we cover our transects.

Watch the videos below of the crew members deploying and recovering the CTD.

Crew members deploying the CTD

Recapturing the CTD

The data from the CTD collection are shown on the picture of the computer screen below:

a photo of a computer monitor showing a screen with three graphs in a row. The first depicts fluorescence (indicating chlorophyll levels) and turbidity v. depth. Chlorophyll levels start out high toward the surface but asymptote toward zero as the probe travels deeper. The central graph is blank. The third depicts salinity and temperature v depth. Salinity stays largely constant, but it does gradually increase with depth. Temperature is higher toward the surface, declines quickly and then slowly with depth. — CTD Data: Fluorescence, or Chlorophyll (green) and Turbidity (orange) v. Depth on the first graph, and Salinity (yellow) and Temperature (blue) v. Depth on the third graph.

The data from the CTD are presented in graphical form. The first frame shows chlorophyll, which is the green line. The second frame is percent oxygen (which they were not measuring so it remains zero). The third frame shows salinity (yellow line) and water temperature (blue line).

Personal log

Currently we are cruising out to our transect destinations over the continental shelf. The seas are a little rough (6-8 foot waves) and I am enjoying some saltine crackers that help with mild sea sickness. It has been a while since I have been in a large boat in rolling seas.

Three days ago, I flew from Anchorage to Kodiak Island on an a sunny afternoon and met the science team for the cruise. The whole team was extremely welcoming, sharing stories of past cruises, colorful characters and the science behind acoustic trawl sampling. Later, they invited me to go surfing the next day at a beach on the far side of the island.

Through the camaraderie of playing in the waves I was introduced to these amazing people and their knowledge and love of the ocean. They are very professional and willing to share what they are studying. They also have a deep concern for the changes occurring in the ocean and honestly hope that their information can be shared and understood in order to mitigate the impact of change. Sitting on my surfboard I quickly learned I was the beginner, and they were the experts. With the experience of time, they would effortlessly snap up and slice through the waves. Smiles and whoops encouraged each other as the sea crashed into the beach.

Four surfers sit on surfboards, facing away from the camera, awaiting the next wave. Beyond the surfers we see a line of mountains. The image is a color palette of grays: gray cloudy sky, gray ocean, dark gray-blue mountains. — Surfing off of Kodiak Island. Photo credit: Mathew Phillips

A surfer rides a wave back toward shore. We can see a mountain, part of Kodiak Island, behind the surfer. Both the sky and the ocean are gray. — Surfing off of Kodiak Island. Photo credit: Mathew Phillips

Surf photos courtesy of Mathew Phillips

The next day was spent with the science crew getting ready to bring aboard equipment they will be using, accessing and streamlining the information they need for the data collection, and also a little bit more shore time with fishing and hiking. I hiked up a local mountain called Pyramid.

Overall this has been a great start for a wonderful trip. I love to get my students outside experiencing the real world. After a year of taking both Oceanography and Marine Biology my students get to touch, see and smell the ocean through a field trip. They get to see marine birds and mammals, touch and taste icebergs and smell the brine scent of the ocean. They also get a chance to apply the knowledge and skills that they have learned in my class. The NOAA as Teacher at Sea Program is my field trip. I get to see the science and technology in action and share it with my students, friends and family. Thanks so much for letting me play!

June 22, 2023June 22, 2023

Laura Guertin: Personal Log for Acoustic-Trawl Survey, June 22, 2023

NOAA Teacher at Sea

Laura Guertin

Aboard NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson

June 10 – June 22, 2023

Mission: 2023 Summer Acoustic-Trawl Survey of Walleye Pollock in the Gulf of Alaska

Geographic Area of Cruise: Islands of Four Mountains area, to Shumagin Islands area
Location (in port, Kodiak Island): 57^o 47.0200′ N, 152^o 25.5543′ W

Date: June 22, 2023

Laura, wearing a heavy orange rain coat and large yellow gloves, holds a pollock (fish) up for a photo. She is also wearing a blue Teacher at Sea beanie. She's standing in the wet lab, where plastic green sorting baskets are stacked behind her on a long metal table. — TAS Laura Guertin and a pollock!

I’m wrapping up my time on NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson. There was so much that went in to getting out to sea for this expedition, and so many people that did so much work pulling for me and coordinating all the logistics before I joined Dyson (starting in 2020!), during my time at sea, and I’m sure after I leave the ship. Thank you to the wonderful people in the NOAA Teacher At Sea Office (Jennifer, Emily, Britta) and for giving me an opportunity to sail as a Teacher At Sea Alumna in 2023.

While waiting to board Oscar Dyson in 2022 during my first trip to Alaska, I prepared several blog posts that provided a background to NOAA, NOAA Fisheries, fisheries surveys, etc. With my undergraduate students in mind as my audience, I wanted to start the posts at the broadest scale and have the content easily utilized in multiple courses that I teach. As I authored these posts from Alaskan hotel rooms in 2022 and in 2023 and not while on the ship, they do not contain personal logs. Again, I thank the Teacher At Sea Program for giving me this flexibility in having one post that captures my personal log from the shortened expedition and keeping the “academic” focus for the prior content.

I’m trained as a geoscientist. During and after my studies in marine geology and geophysics, I’ve had the opportunity to participate in fieldwork in expeditions that have lasted hours to days to weeks to months. Although I think I know what it takes to live/work at sea, I’m reminded of new challenges on new ships in new ocean basins. It is so important as an educator that I take advantage of opportunities to get out to sea for my own professional development and to remind myself of what to share with students and community members when I present the story of what we did during our time at sea. I know I sound like a broken record – I’ve written these same words before. But that doesn’t mean these points are less important!

First topic of reflection – the people

This expedition had 32 people on board, which included the science party, bridge crew, stewards, engineering, deck, electronics technicians, and survey. The people on Oscar Dyson were born/raised and live in parts across the United States. Some people were sailing on a NOAA ship for the first time, and a few people were working for their first time on the ocean! We all have different backgrounds and training and personalities. In a way, I feel like stepping on to Oscar Dyson was like joining a game of Yahtzee – put all of these people together, shake us up (by sending us out to sea), and see what rolls out. Fortunately, during this “game”, everybody was a winner. On this 208.6-foot long ship, everyone has a purpose and function, and we must all work together to accomplish our research goals and the mission of the expedition. And to be successful, this group was supportive, understanding, respectful, took the time to listen, and made sure to laugh and smile through everything we faced.

Person standing on a ship on the ocean with clouds and an island in the background — Departing Kodiak aboard NOAA Ship *Oscar* *Dyson*

Next topic – the work

The schedule is very different than one I keep as an instructor. At home, I know the days/times I’m teaching, and I have a calendar to organize meetings and personal appointments. I’m pretty much in charge and in control of my own schedule. At sea, it’s not “me” but “we” when it comes to all day, each and every day. There are no weekends or holidays off. We work 12-hour shifts (mine was 4AM to 4PM) during the entire expedition. Once you leave your room at the start of your shift, you can’t go back to your room until your shift is over (you are sharing a room with someone that works a different shift than you, so the room is theirs during your work time).

But you are plenty busy during your 12 hours! There can be downtime as the ship transits to a site to begin data collection, and the weather can cause a change of plans for where you are headed and what work you can do. High winds, rainstorms, cold air temperatures, the ship rolling and heaving… we faced it all during our 13 days at sea.

And this work is hard! It is a balance of the physical demands faced by the deck crew setting the trawl net, and those working in the fish lab to furiously and accurately process the catch brought on board, and everyone ensuring that safety is a top priority at all times. The Chief Scientist working in the ship’s acoustics laboratory and all the NOAA Corps Officers working on the bridge must balance the scientific mission with the realities of our present situation – is there too much ship traffic to “go fishing” and set out the trawl net? Are there whales or other marine mammals in the vicinity? Is the wind speed too high for us to operate safely?

Everything on Oscar Dyson operates at a different pace and schedule from back home. Fortunately, we are able to balance out our time in the laboratories with taking short breaks to view beautiful sunrises and do some whale watching. Again, it is the amazing group of people on this ship, from the seasoned sailors to those doing fisheries work for the first time, that come together to mentor and support one another. They all make the work not seem like “work” but instead a really enjoyable and exciting time, knowing our efforts are making a difference for sustainable fisheries.

person standing on a ship with a volcanic mountain in the background — TAS Laura Guertin in the Gulf of Alaska

Final topic – what comes next

My time on Oscar Dyson has provided me an amazing opportunity and wealth of information about a field where I have had no training. Now that Leg 1 of the 2023 Summer Survey has wrapped up, I’m reminded of a popular saying from one of my graduate school faculty members – “so what?”

“So what?” stands for a family of questions or an attitude that leads to consideration of the broader significance of specific studies. These kinds of questions are particularly useful in descriptive research because, often, one can get so absorbed in collecting, organizing, and analyzing observations one forgets to consider the implications of the results. — Ginsburg (1982), Seeking Answers; suggestions for students

This “so what” piece is something I will spend even more time in the future thinking about. The “so what” of the survey is clear – NOAA does an excellent job explaining what sustainable fisheries are and why it matters (see my previous blog posts). But I still need to do a better job of figuring out how to connect the dots – the endpoints being what we do on the water (and the data we collect) to the production of the annual Status of Stocks and other products NOAA uses to inform the ecosystem management. The Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, the primary law that governs marine fisheries management in federal waters, is also something I want to get up to speed on.

In addition, I need to think about defining the “so what” for the various audiences I will be sharing my at-sea experience. I have more NOAA resources to explore, such as The NOAA Fisheries Distribution Mapping and Analysis Portal (DisMAP) and The Fisheries One Stop Shop (FOSS) Public Data Portal. I will certainly be looking for other resources to pull in to my materials for students and presentations to the public, ranging from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) to episodes of The Fisheries Podcast. I also look forward to exploring more resources on diversity and representation in fisheries science, with articles catching my eye: Women Leaders Are Essential for Tackling Ocean Sustainability Challenges (Fisheries Magazine, 2023) and Examining Diversity Inequities in Fisheries Science: A Call to Action (BioScience, 2016).

So my learning is not done! The sharing of my adventure and new knowledge is only beginning, and I look forward to sharing my pollock survey stories to not only positively impact the ocean literacy of my audiences, but to show how NOAA’s fishery work helps us address the Ocean Decade Challenges (part of the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development).

ship on the sea during sunrise — Sunrise view from Oscar Dyson (June 2023)

June 22, 2023June 22, 2023

Laura Guertin: Ending with a Sea Shanty for Acoustic-Trawling for Walleye Pollock, June 22, 2023

NOAA Teacher at Sea

Laura Guertin

Aboard NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson

June 10 – June 22, 2023

Mission: 2023 Summer Acoustic-Trawl Survey of Walleye Pollock in the Gulf of Alaska

Geographic Area of Cruise: Islands of Four Mountains area, to Shumagin Islands area
Location (in port, Kodiak Island): 57^o 47.0200′ N, 152^o 25.5543′ W

Date: June 22, 2023

Person wearing blue hat on the back of a ship on the ocean — TAS Laura Guertin shows off her Teacher at Sea beanie aboard NOAA Ship *Oscar* *Dyson*

As we return to Kodiak, Alaska, for Leg 1 to wrap up and Leg 2 to begin of the 2023 Summer Survey, it’s exciting to know that even during our shortened expedition time at sea, we’ve collected data that is going to inform Alaska walleye pollock stock assessment models and catch allocation. Any/all data are good data to have! I have thoroughly enjoyed my time on Oscar Dyson and met some incredibly smart, passionate, kind, creative, and innovative people. The NOAA community is filled with amazing individuals that are not only dedicated to the NOAA science mission but then sharing that new knowledge with others. I’ve played a small part in this NOAA community during the expedition (while wearing my NOAA hat!), but I hope my future teaching and outreach efforts will shine an even brighter spotlight on the essential work carried out by NOAA Fisheries and the agency as a whole.

Prior to joining the ship, this past academic year was filled with some highs and lows in teaching and student learning. There’s one topic that I’m not quite sure how to classify – and that’s the emergence of Chat GPT, and how AI is being used in higher education. I was joking with the Instructional Designer at my campus (Penn State Brandywine) that I was going to write a sea shanty about this expedition. Turns out, he was able to get AI (Bing, specifically) to write one for me! So as I wrap up my time as a Teacher At Sea Alumna, I leave you with these versus to sing to your favorite shanty rhythm.

A Song of Pollock and Trawls

Oh we are the surveyors of the Gulf so vast and wide
We sail the seas with acoustic gear to find the pollock hide
We use sound waves to scan the depths and mark what we have found
We measure their abundance and their biomass by the pound

(Chorus)

Yo ho ho as we sing this song
On Leg 2 we’ll bring the DriX along
Yo ho ho as we sing this song
We love our job and we love our fish
We love our job and we love our fish

We work in shifts around the clock to cover all the grounds
We set the course and speed and time to trawl a certain length
We haul the net and sort the catch and check their age and health
We record all the data and we share it with the world

(Chorus)

We do this work for science and for management as well
We help to keep the fishery sustainable and well
We study the pollock’s life history, ecology, and stock
We are proud to be part of this crew and this important work

(Chorus)

Oh we are the surveyors of the Gulf so vast and wide
We sail the seas with acoustic gear to find the pollock hide
We love our job and we love our fish
We love our job and we love our fish