Mangroves and Caves

Today we started our first research project. Our group was studying mangroves today. One of the creatures that lives in the mangrove pond that we were visiting is the Cassiopeia, or upside down jelly.

We were counting how many jellies were hanging out at different depths of the pond. So we would lay a rope on the bottom, our transect. Then we would stop every time the water got half a meter deep and count how many jellies were in a half meter by half meter quadrat (square).

We had everything set up randomly like good scientists but I guess all the jellies were chilling on other parts of the pond. They sit upside down because they have photosynthetic algae that lives in their tentacles. By sitting upside down, the algae gets more sunlight. It also means these jellies are more likely to be in shallow water because they get more sunshine that way. While we were swimming around checking out the pond, I found a swimming sea slug.

 He was hard to focus on. So I took a video of him. I'll see if I can upload it. I actually saw three of these guys. Including one chilling on the bottom.

We got out after the first set of transects and had our bagged lunch. The Brits were all very excited about taking a brown bag lunch. They thought it was pretty amusing. We've had lots of discussions on cereals you can only find in America, like Oreo-o's. They say you can get lucky charms in the super fancy department stores over there. Crazy. We did a second set of transects on the other side of the pond. When my group finished, I got out because I was shivering. I laid in the sun to warm up for a bit. When everyone else got out we went on a bit of a hike and found a cave. I happened to have a flashlight in my backpack (once a girl scout, always a girl scout) and we went through and came out on the other side it was pretty neat.

 It looked like some people had been camping in the cave. And lots of pieces have been broken off. The whole island is limestone so that's what all of this is. The rest of the group didn't come into the cave with us and found a cave with a lake in it. I'm sorta sad I missed it but we had to rush back to the bus. We went to pick up the other group at the sea grass beds and where they were hanging out was much prettier than where we were. But we'll be there on Monday when it's supposed to be less windy and a little warmer.

Now we're showing and getting clean before we go play with our data and see what we end up with. What a great trip so far!