Fri, 5 Feb:
i love to get up early, ... but i don't usually wake up early. Breakfast is at 7am. Marie was going to knock on my door, but she and Nick were going out at 6am, so i was on my own to get up. i woke up in the same position i was in when i got into bed. i didn't move an inch. i had a wonderful night's sleep. when i woke up, it was just getting daylight, i opened the door to my deck and got to see the sunrise. Let's get the day started !
photo of sunrise:
off to breakfast of pancakes, omlette, sausage, and some kind of warm custard that i did not get, and should NOT have taken a taste of ... it was really good. i sat with Fagan, our boat Captain, also Dive Master.
i was to meet with Alex at 9am to do some Sea Grass work. he said that since the wind had died down, and it was clear and hot; we'd change the plan. instead i was to go out with he and his dad to spot stingrays. i found Fagan and told him we'd be ready to leave in 1/2 hr. i went back to put on my suit and sunscreen. it's an on-going study of the Stingrays. a specific line is designated one mile long and mapped on the GPS. Fagan drives the boat slowly, following the GPS reading, keeping it on that 'line'. we stand on the bow of the boat. Alex looks left of the 'line', and Ray looks right of the 'line'. i am the 'scribe'. when Alex sees a stingray, he tells me how many meters it is from the 'line', and that side is negative. Ray does the same thing on the right side, which is positive. so i would write down -12 or +9. they also tell me if it is small, medium, or large in size. also male or female if it's possible to tell, which it usually is not because they are too far away to see and you are looking at them through the water. also anything else i should note, for instance, we spotted a nurse shark. Fagan keeps track of the mileage, and let's us know when our mile is about up. then we drive to the next location and repeat. this is called transecting and we did 9 of them ... and saw anywhere from 6 to 13 stingrays per mile. we started at about 10:30am and finished around noon. it was so cool standing on the bow of the boat, above this beautiful turquoise water, seeing stingrays and other fish at your feet. the surf was crashing over the coral reef on our right.... it was almost too much to take in! i can't believe i am doing this!
Photo of the lagoon. Those are frigit birds. usually you see them flying, not sitting on a dead tree, .... like vultures. Alex said that that tree was on another caye that used to be there. it was a small one, and a hurricane blew it away ! so now all that is left is a dead tree or two and very shallow sandy water. it's really pretty ! ....ok, it's ALL really pretty ! :)
it was after noon, so time to get back for lunch (environmentalists still have their priorities). lunch was tuna salad on fresh bread, ... and .... i had my first lettuce and tomatoes. wow, it tasted good! haven't eaten either because you don't know if they washed them in good drinking water or not, so it's best not to chance it.
after lunch i found Marie and asked her if i could help with anything. she said she and Nick were going to do quadrants for the Sea Grass Study.
Picture of Sea Grass area just in front of Dining Room where we do the Sea Grass Study:
it was a hot day, and the sun had heated up the shallow water. i mean it was HOT. so hot, that you didn't want to just stand there coz it hurt your feet! amazing! there were bouys in the water. we took a measuring tape and tied it to the bouys underwater on the sand, and strung the tape between the bouys. so we made a 3 lines of measuring tape, on the sand, underwater, each 50 meters long. they were about 10 meters apart; which means the first line is in about a foot of water, and the second line is in about 2.5 feet of water, the 3rd in about 4 feet of water. we started at the shallow end, since the deeper line will be more difficult because it will be totally under water. then we took a wire square, and placed it on the sand, outlining any sea grass that was there, at specific intervals; determined by some scientist somewhere. so we looked at the measuring tape, and at 2meters, we put a square around the sea grass. then stuck a sign in the sand above the square that will designate what the coordinates were. then we clean up the area within the square, taking out any old dead grass and anything else that isn't living there. then we take a photo of it.
pic of quadrant like this ....
so we did this along the three 50 meter lines. for the 2nd and 3rd lines, we used our snorkel and mask, since we had to go under water to place the square, clean out the squares and take photos. it was kind of difficult, because we didn't have weight belts on and when we got down to clean out the squares, we floated back up to the surface. eventually, i put my foot down there, so Marie could hold on to it, to hold her down. we got a pretty good routine of teamwork going about the time we finished. the purpose is to measure the density of sea grass ... how much sea grass is in what area. we spent about 2 hours doing this. it thought it was quite fun; but they weren't too enthused about the task. this reminded me of what "i think" Pam does in the summertime with her field grasses study. i'm sure this is MUCH more fun!
when that was finished, Marie asked me if i wanted to go out with she and Nick to do something similar with the stringray study she is doing. yes! of course i did! we took our snorkel gear and got in the boat and headed out. Nick drove and Marie and i got to stand at the bow of the boat. it's such fun up there, i guess because you never get to do it, coz your mom would say it isn't safe :) but what's the worst that could happen? .... you'd fall in that beautiful warm turquoise water!
when we got to the site, the first thing i saw underwater was a conch walking on the sand. i missed the conch, but here is a pic of it's tracks:
conch tracks.
back to the study, Marie had another measuring tape on a reel. she tied it to a bouy. then she used her GPS and some computer model. she let out about 10 meters of line, then swam in a circle around the bouy until the computer told her to stop. then she had Nick free-dive down to the bottom and place another 'square' made of PVC pipe, on the sand. i was given a depth gauge, so i would then free-dive down to the bottom and take a reading on how deep it was. then Nick would take a photograph. then Marie would continue making her circle and stop at the next location and we'd do the same thing. after a complete circle, Marie would let out some more tape, so the circle would be larger, and go around and do the same thing. we collected 30 data samples. this study is done in a stringray feeding ground. and these photos would give a random sampling of what was on the bottom and how deep. we did this for about 1.5 hrs ... it was after 5pm now, and time to stand on the bow of the boat again :) ... and head back for dinner ... again priorities ... however ... first priority was a shower! when i got here yesterday, they had run out of rain water in our shower. the water had to be pumped to fill the tanks again and they did that today ... so we had water .... water , just water, NO hot water here either!
dinner was at 6pm, we had baked chicken in a tomato sauce, noodles with parmesan cheese, and steamed veggies.
WHAT A DAY ! my first day and i got to help on 3 projects !!!!!!!!!!!! again, i am reminded, i am a very lucky girl !!!!
by the way, i am an official Belizean girl as of today .... i took my sandals off, and i'm walking around barefoot :)
i went to the library after dinner, with still no luck in uploading any photos. Alex told me that between 1am-6am, i wouldn't have any trouble uploading photos. can i get up in the middle of the night for my blog ????? i returned to my room, i noticed it was thundering; then realized that i managed to lock myself out of my room. i know what happened. there is a hole in the floor and a 'pin lock' at the bottom of the door. when i closed the door, the 'pin' slid down into the floor and locked the door shut. there were some guys playing cards and they told me how i could find Buck. he kindly helped me get in. he went under the bungalow with a stick, and pushed the pin back up while i pushed the door open. good to know that anyone can unlock my door from under my room .... not to worry though. i feel totally safe here. as i was getting ready for bed, it started pouring rain. there is a tin roof and it was so incredibly noisy, i couldn't wait for it to stop. eventually it did, and i went to bed.
me following right behind the dolphins !
this Bottle Nose Dolphin and this Spotted Dolphin seemed to be especially close; they were always hanging out together, swimming along side of each other.
they kept swimming back to check on us, to make sure we were still following:
keep in mind that we are in the wild sea ... NOT a Marine Park ... these are wild animals that have chosen to spend some time with us !!!!!!!!!! Marie said that all of this is very unusual even for divers and snorkelers with years of experience. to have even ONE experience with a Ray, Turtle, or Dolphin ... much less ALL of them in one afternoon !!!!!!!!!! ..... have i said what a lucky girl i am ?
i have also posted a video of the dolphins on You Tube. go to www.youtube.com and type in "Glovers -- Dolphins" in the search box.
finally we decided that we should go in ... without any stingray data :( ..... but we weren't finished with our luck yet ..... on the way in Marie spotted this Nurse Shark, with it's head under some coral ... you can just see his tail and body ... sleeping ... sound asleep obviously; because it never moved, and we photographed each other along side it for quite awhile.
me
this is the BEST DAY yet .... could there possibly be more ?????????
