Thursday, July 24, 2014

The big assignment part 1 & 2

Last weeks class was fantastic. The party boat guy(name escapes me at the time of writing) was great and really lived up to the saying swears like a sailor which I personally found to be a nice touch. Anyways enough of that and a bit more of the academics which is the driving force behind all this!

So far in this class we learned a few things about fish which I think typically go unsaid. Fish like food, preferably bread as they all went crazy for what I believe was sour dough at Boston Harbor the first weekend. Another thing that has become quite apparent is how naive and greedy fish can be. This is also made very clear on our chartered boat trip last Friday the 18th. Pictured below is the first fish to fall for our simple trap - a sea worm attached to a hook which according to Bruce is equivalent to Doritos to the sea world.

Black sea bass - A little longer than 14"

So far this makes sense, small food, small fish + greed and hunger give us fish that will take any chance they can get at a free lunch. Trying to stick to the theme of a learning environment let this be an example of things either seeming to good to be true- there are no free lunches in life so watch out!

Striped sea bass in cooler

So you've made it this far reading this post and are probably starting to wonder, how would someone go about catching such a large fish like the big striped sea bass chilling in the cooler above? Well the answer is step up your game from sea worms and freshly baked bread and get into the recycling smaller fish for bigger fish. In our case we used the Silver Hake Whiting. A smaller fish about 5 or so inches long. After catching this fish it was placed into a bucket and forced into a circular motion to induce fish CPR and get it breath the water again.

(photo borrowed from another post on this blog. Thanks Charlette!) White Silver Hake before CPR^




Flounder. Flounder is a pretty interesting fish as it transforms where its eyes and mouth are located within the first year of its life. This is because flounder live sideways on the ocean floor. The eyes both facing upwards enables this fish to hunt for food as well as protect itself from danger.  The underside of these flounder is white which is the side that is on the ocean floor most of the time.
Flounder top view

Flounder bottom view.

Flounder head shot. This photo makes my skin crawl but I figured someone might enjoy this.

Going inside








Tide 7/18/14 Boston, MA (Source)


Part 2 - Lovells Island










Periwinkle (Marine Snail)








Invasive Asian Shore Crab
Photo borrowed as I didn't have my camera near the water. Thanks!

Snail

Barnacles
Thanks for the photos Zhang!


Random Photo of Gas Tank from 93:

"RAINBOW SWASH - World's Largest Piece of Copyrighted Artwork"

Added because of its proximity to the harbor and fun facts,
http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/rainbow-swash

Notes



2 comments:

Unknown said...

#krillex #roflcopter

Unknown said...

Do fish like Tequila maybe? #deep #blessed #grateful #burnslikehell