From Snails to Whales: Team Hashtag... My Findings

Thursday, July 17, 2014

Team Hashtag... My Findings

07/13/2014

Hola!

I hope everyone had a good rest after our multiple adventures. On Sunday we embarked in a hands on experience where I was able to improve my observational skills and identify multiple species that I was not familiar with. Everything started at the aquarium where we took an amazing ride on the Cultural Connector to Fan Pier Cove.

I had to post this picture. What a view!

Proposal Plan for the Fan Pier Cove

As we walked by the Boston Inner Harbor, we arrived at our destination, the good old Barking Crab. They were kind enough to let us use their docks in order to start our assignment. My team: Team Hashtag was simply incredible. I had the honor of working with Sonja, Chris, and Dan. We all found different species and collaborated with each other when it came to finding the names of each. I have to say that we were all impressed by what the ocean had to offer. There was so much that at some point we did not know what to choose from.

The dock we used to make our observations

There were nine species that I observed and that I was able to to identify:

1. The first specie was the Sea Lettuce. This type of seaweed was found in many parts of the docks that we had the opportunity to explore. As you can see from the picture above, sea lettuces were very visible to the eye and their color can grasp the attention of anybody. After some research I found that they are found year around, but they are especially visible during the summer time. Also, when they are taken out of the water to dry, their color changes from green to either Black or white.

2. The second specie that I observed was attached to the Sea Lettuce above. This little animal grabbed the attention of my entire group as it was very tiny and when we observed it with the magnifying glass we were able to observe much of its body. After doing some research and using the guide book, it was decided that this specie is called an Amphipod. Sea lettuces provide a "home" to this little creatures which is the reason there were so many of them on it. Their sizes and colors ranges from 1/4 in to 1 in long and from grey, sand color, and green. The one we observed was about .7 cm long and its colors were black and yellow. Also, most of them have arched backs, which is a characteristic we found on the amphipod.

3. The third specie is called a Blue Mussel. I found this mussel attached to the side of the dock and that is not uncommon for this type of species as most of them can be found on rocks or almost any solid object. They are long and have growth lines on them. Almost all are either blue-black or black. The one I found was black when placed in the water and the color turned a light black with some white when placed in the sun.

4 & 5. The fourth and fifth species are member of the same family and are called Golden Star Tunicate. These colonies can have different colors. The ones that I found were orange (left picture) and white (picture below). Other colors could consist of red, black, green, brown, or purple. It is very common to see a "think rubbery crust" protecting the whole colony and most of the time, they can be found on shells, rocks, or bases of sea weed. The location for both was on top of the blue mussel.

The colors in each are incredible, especially when they are in the water

6. The sixth specie, which I also found on top of the blue mussel, is called Lacy Crust Bryozoan. This is also a colony with a particular color, white. The crust is arranged individually and most of the time is round. They are located in surfaces of other species like seaweeds and mussels and are very common in low tide lines or shallow waters.

7. The seventh specie was one of the three animals we saw when Professor Berman pulled the fishing cage out of the water. This animal is called an Atlantic Rock Crab. They are mostly reddish with short legs and from my observations this particular crab had some white on its bottom, which is a common description for them. When I was reading the guide, it mentioned how this crab enters "lobster pots" and many lobster-men considered this crab a bait-stealer. No wonder this little guy or girl was among the fishing cage.

8. The eight specie was the second out of the three from the fishing cage. This animal is called a Common Spider Crab. I have to say that this animal grabbed my attention by the texture and color of its shell. These crabs are known to have a much more circular shell with a , from my perspective, dried cement texture to it. They are well known by their long legs, colors, and little spiny shells. Males tend to grow much larger than females and they are found mostly in harbors, rocky shores and bay bottoms.

9. The last specie I observed was a well known animal here in New England, a North Atlantic Lobster. These lobsters are also known as "The American Lobster" or the "Massachusetts Lobster." They range in colors from orange (the one I saw was this color), greenish-brown, grey, light yellow, and even blue! These lobsters are found in the east cost of North America and many of them eat fresh food like fish and clams. One thing I do have to mention is that I was amazed of how calm the lobster got once our classmate Chris started to put him to sleep (assuming it was a male after Professor Berman advised us that most females have v-notched on their tails so lobster-men do take them as is illegal in MA). Most of these lobsters live or hide in sea weeds and rocky habitats in order to protect themselves from predators and have enough food resources.

Sources:

Required Guide Books

http://www.edc.uri.edu/restoration/html/gallery/plants/sea.htm
http://www.sms.si.edu/irlspec/Botryllus_schlosseri.htm
https://sites.google.com/a/rsu5.org/invasive/maine-invasive-species/lacy-crust-bryozoan-membranipora-membranacea
http://www.edc.uri.edu/restoration/html/gallery/invert/spider.htm
http://www.nefsc.noaa.gov/faq/fishfaq7.html

Daniela Baeza-Prepetit

No comments:

From Snails to Whales

Welcome to Snails to Whales, Bruce Berman's blog focused on both the little and the big things that make Boston Harbor such an interesting and extraordinary place to live, work and play.

With 50 miles of protected water, four sheltered bays, seven river systems, 34 islands and a nine-foot average tide, Boston Harbor is one of the most diverse urban ecosystems in America.

This blog focuses on the flora and fauna of Boston Harbor and Massachusetts Bay - on the beach, the shore, and the harbor islands, and in the cleaner waters of Boston Harbor and Mass Bay - including this ecosystems most important species - people.

During the summer, it is also a place for my Boston University Students and my colleagues at Save the Harbor / Save the Bay to share their work and experiences.

Where I am coming from...

Love that clean(er) water
Learning about the Boston Harbor Cleanup from the waterway’s eyes, ears, and mouthpiece

By Brian Fitzgerald, BU Bridge

On Georges Island, Bruce Berman talks with his students about the history of the Boston Harbor Cleanup,
which is largely complete. Photo by Vernon Doucette

Bruce Berman, aboard a ferry from Boston’s Long Wharf to Georges Island, poses a question to his students: “How clean is clean enough?”

He’s talking about the water below.

It’s a brilliant July day, with the smell of salt spray in the air. The sky is clear, and so is the ocean. But there was a time when Boston Harbor wasn’t so clean, when the stench of sewage assaulted the nostrils of anyone who went near it.

Berman is the communications director for Save the Harbor/Save the Bay, a public-interest environmental advocacy organization whose mission is to help restore and protect the harbor and Massachusetts Bay. He also teaches a Metropolitan College summer course called Politics, Public Relations, and Public Policy: The Boston Harbor Cleanup.

“The Boston Harbor Cleanup is an amazing success story, and I just love to share it with students,” says Berman, noting that the harbor’s “bad old days” weren’t that long ago. Those were the days when untreated human waste, syringes, condoms, and tampon applicators routinely washed ashore. The antiquated sewage treatment plants on Deer Island and Nut Island were so poorly designed and maintained that they flooded during even mild rainstorms, sending millions of gallons of untreated waste directly into the harbor.

Since then, bacteria counts in the water have decreased by more than two-thirds. Now the harbor teems with plants and animals, and people can legally dig for clams on Carson Beach in South Boston, which was unheard of in the 1980s.

“It was one of the filthiest harbors in America, and now it’s one of the cleanest,” says Berman. “What I’m trying to impress upon students is how this incredible comeback occurred, and how business, advocacy groups, environmentalists, and government can affect the outcome of large projects such as the Boston Harbor Cleanup through negotiation.”

Paradise regained

Berman points to the left as the boat cruises by the cleanup’s centerpiece: the gargantuan white egglike tanks of the Deer Island waste treatment plant, which in 1995 replaced the antiquated facility. The plant treats an average of 350 million gallons of sewage a day.

“And what comes out of the Deer Island treatment plant?” he asks. Berman, his booming baritone competing with the roar of planes taking off from Logan Airport, has a habit of putting students on the spot to see if they’re paying attention.

“The outfall pipe,” say several simultaneously. “Treated water,” chime in a few more.

“That’s right,” he says with a smile. “The plant separates the solid and liquid waste, and it pumps the treated water through the 9.5-mile outfall pipe, which empties into Massachusetts Bay. The resulting sludge is converted to high-grade fertilizer.”

Now Berman returns to his original question: “How clean is clean enough?” There’s no quick and clear answer to this one. “It’s a question that at the end of the day the federal courts had to decide.”

In 1985, a landmark federal court case required that the harbor’s beaches be made swimmable and fishable by 2000. Save the Harbor/Save the Bay was formed the next year to raise public awareness of the $4.5 billion Boston Harbor Cleanup. Sewer ratepayers in the 43 cities and towns financing the project cried foul over the prospect of astronomically rising bills, but because of the determination of environmental advocacy groups such as Berman’s, the cleanup was largely completed on schedule.

Berman says it isn’t finished, however. There are still frequent beach closures because the counts of Enterococcus bacteria exceed the federal and state standard for swimming. The culprit: filthy storm water and sewage, much of it from leaky pipes and illegal hookups emptying into storm sewers, and then into the harbor.

“So is the harbor clean enough,” the Springfield native asks his students, “when you can’t swim in it one out of five days in the summer?”

Work to be done

Berman and his class look out from Georges Island to Gallops Island (left) and the white tanks of the waste treatment plant on Deer Island (right). Photo by Vernon Doucette

This summer the state approved one of the last parts of the cleanup: the construction, by 2011, of a 2.1-mile tunnel near the Dorchester and South Boston shorelines that will hold sewage and storm water during bad weather. It then will be pumped to Deer Island for treatment.

Berman is ecstatic over this development, the result of “tireless negotiation and consensus-building,” he says. “After 2011, we’re looking at beach closings once every five years, when there is a major storm, instead of once every five days.”

But he is not about to let his guard down. To say that he is a man obsessed with the harbor cleanup would be an understatement. Berman is also Save the Harbor/Save the Bay’s “Baywatcher,” and he lives on his 40-foot trawler Verandah. Polluters beware: if you’re discharging oil or sewage into Boston Harbor, the Baywatcher just might be watching.

He is quick to point out that his zealotry is not just on behalf of the harbor’s flora and fauna. “The harbor is for everyone,” he says. “If you’re from a working class or poor family in Boston, and you can’t afford a Cape Cod getaway in the summer, a clean harbor is important. The same is true if you’re a tourist vacationing in Boston or you happen to live in a pricey waterfront condo.”

Accordingly, Berman, who was a political consultant and contributing editor to the Phoenix newspaper before joining Save the Harbor/Save the Bay nearly 10 years ago, also teaches his students about the harbor’s role in the city’s economy. He points out that in the early 1990s, just a few ferries cruised the harbor’s waters. Today, more than 100,000 people visit its islands each summer, discovering their ecological and historic treasures.

“The best way to protect the harbor cleanup,” Berman tells his students, “is to make sure that the public has access to the resources and can see a return on its investment.”

Trevor Kosmolsick (MET’05) has lived in Boston for seven years, but until taking Berman’s course, he had never been to the waterfront. “I’ve also wanted to go camping in the area, but I never knew that you could camp on a few of the islands,” he says. “Bruce Berman is not only a great professor, but the ultimate tour guide.”

He also backs up his words with actions. Sometimes he takes off his shirt and dives in the water to demonstrate to passing boaters that it’s safe to swim. To show people on ferries that fishing is safe, he’s been known to grab one of the bluefish or striped bass he’s caught and (very carefully) plant a wet kiss on it.

“What I want everyone to understand is that investment in the environment really does pay off,” says Berman. “We’re willing to pay for a clean Boston Harbor, so we should enjoy it.”

From Snails to Whales

Thursday, July 17, 2014

Team Hashtag... My Findings

No comments:

Nature Blog Network

My Favorite Nature Blogs