I have now been on the beautiful island of Utila for just over a week. Utila is part of the Bay Islands that lie off the east coast of Honduras in the Caribbean Sea. I am part of an Oxford University expedition studying both the shallow and mesophotic (deep - 30 to 100m) reefs around the island. Funded by the Royal Geographical Society's fieldwork apprenticeship, I have been able to come and learn from the best in this beautiful place!
This first week has been manic... arriving on Utila on the 29th August, we got straight to work as the first project was looking at the spawning of O. faveolata coral, a vital reef building species but one that is also under immense pressure. The research involved building coral spawn collectors made out of mosquito nets and upside down bottles however, we were under time pressure as the window in which this particular species spawns was 4-7th September and so the 60 collectors had to be built and placed along the reef before then. Unfortunately due to a slight technical glue issue the collectors did not work in the water - the bottle caps refused to remain in place and attached to the upside down bottles and so a change of plans was made! Instead of collecting the spawn we went night diving to monitor the coral spawning visually. On my first night dive I saw a species related to O. faveolata spawning and it was incredible! The timing with which all the eggs are released from the coral colony is impeccable and it seemed that as soon as one colony had finished it's next door neighbor started. It was like diving in a snow globe. The picture below was taken by the incredibly talented Erika Gress, who was leading the O. faveolata research.
My main role so far has been to help with transects in the
water as part of the shallow dive team. We have been identifying the O. faveolata
coral along transects at 2 sites close to shore to complement the spawning
research. Many of the transects are done by video so they can be analysed later
and so a lot of what I have been doing is filming underwater and well as carrying a lot of pvc piping for measuring!
This next week we are heading out on boats to different sites further out to start working on some of the other projects of the expedition. I am also learning some lab stuff, including how to do urchin behavioral trials and sort sediment from sediment traps. Right now though I'm heading back under to hang out with the fishes!
