Today's topic: Barnacles

We had another fun day on the water in Santa Cruz. Under the threat of reported heavy 6-8’ seas we set out on the R/V Paragon and were welcomed by clear skies and flat calm waters. On the way out I noticed 1 of 2 Team O’Neill catamarans. You know O’Neill, famed wetsuit and surf apparel manufacturer. Well here is where your money is going. Apparently I’m in the wrong biz.

But Team O’Neill doesn’t get to play with nifty machines like this thingy called an Acrobat. I’m going out on a limb and I’m going to say that the reason oceanographers have so much training in physics and calculus is so they can justify buying expensive toys.

The acrobat is towed behind the boat and can adjust its wings to surface and dive in the water. Slap some instruments on there and you can measure all kinds of stuff in 3 dimensions. Check out this graph that our team produced from the acrobat data. Cool! Bright colors and lines and fancy stuff!

Actually that big red blob in the middle is a big patch of phytoplankton, microscopic plants that float around the ocean and feed barnacles which by chance is today’s topic! Actually it’s not today’s topic, but it is the title of this handout that my sister got me from the local pirate store in San Francisco.

Anyways, I thought I would flex some of my photographic might and show you this nice picture of a dolphin that I saw while towing the acrobat. Isn’t it a nice shot? That water looks positively spectacular too! You might even think that the dolphin was actually in captivity at Long Marine lab and was actually curious about these strange hairless apes staring at it. But you would be wrong. This is a wild dolphin.

So I’ve officially left Santa Cruz and actually been back to San Diego for a few days and then left again. Where did I go? Stay tuned to find out where I’m at!

(most of you know already so it’s not that exciting but it makes for some better writing if there is suspense ya know?)

I’ll leave you with this parting picture of Team Upwelling/Relaxation, the group that I worked in while in the PISCO oceanography class. Props to our TA Olivia who is bunny earing Margaret (one of the instructors).