Today I have the day off because there was a chance of thunderstorms. Now it is sunny and 18 degrees outside but it's too late to go now, haha. So I will continue sitting around enjoying the nice day.
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Day off
Yesterday was a pretty good day, we caught plenty of adult sturgeon. They were all pretty medium size and we haven't caught a really big one yet. The cool thing though was we caught a sturgeon that looked pretty much albino. It was very light colored. I will attach a picture. other than that it was just a pretty regular day and thankfully it didn't rain.
Today I have the day off because there was a chance of thunderstorms. Now it is sunny and 18 degrees outside but it's too late to go now, haha. So I will continue sitting around enjoying the nice day.
Today I have the day off because there was a chance of thunderstorms. Now it is sunny and 18 degrees outside but it's too late to go now, haha. So I will continue sitting around enjoying the nice day.
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Bumming on the beach.
In my last post a minute ago I forgot to mention that when we were getting ready to go pull the last night we decided that we didn't need all 5 of us in the boat so Sarah and I stayed on the beach where we had been doing our field work.
It was just a little sandy section of shore just downstream of sturgeon falls but it was sunny and warm and had lots of interesting things. I found a spot where it looked like a turtle nest had been because there were a bunch of soft broken egg shells laying around. I also decided to be my random self and climb up one of the banks to see what was around and came across 2 garter snakes. One was pretty big and about 3 feet long and one was smaller and only about a foot long. But the weird thing was that the smaller one looked like it was molting but got stuck because the very end of it's tail looked like it was tied in a not. I dunno how that happened..and it wasn't just curled up that way because it was dragging it's tail along that way. Being the kind of person I am, I picked it up and carefully untied it's tail....I wasn't sure if it was the right thing to do, but I was just trying to help. I put it down and it slithered away so I hope it was good.
There was other random neat stuff like an owl pellet and the world's greatest skipping stone. Sadly, I am not very skilled in the ways of the skipping stone so I threw it and it hit the water once, flew about 10 ft and then hit the water and sank. maybe next time.
This has been my random explanation of a nice half hour bumming around on a random beach along the Winnipeg river. haha.
It was just a little sandy section of shore just downstream of sturgeon falls but it was sunny and warm and had lots of interesting things. I found a spot where it looked like a turtle nest had been because there were a bunch of soft broken egg shells laying around. I also decided to be my random self and climb up one of the banks to see what was around and came across 2 garter snakes. One was pretty big and about 3 feet long and one was smaller and only about a foot long. But the weird thing was that the smaller one looked like it was molting but got stuck because the very end of it's tail looked like it was tied in a not. I dunno how that happened..and it wasn't just curled up that way because it was dragging it's tail along that way. Being the kind of person I am, I picked it up and carefully untied it's tail....I wasn't sure if it was the right thing to do, but I was just trying to help. I put it down and it slithered away so I hope it was good.
There was other random neat stuff like an owl pellet and the world's greatest skipping stone. Sadly, I am not very skilled in the ways of the skipping stone so I threw it and it hit the water once, flew about 10 ft and then hit the water and sank. maybe next time.
This has been my random explanation of a nice half hour bumming around on a random beach along the Winnipeg river. haha.
Tuesday, June 10
Last week we continued netting juveniles and collecting our usual data. It was a pretty good week with the exception of friday, because it was pouring rain the entire day and I found out my so called "rain gear" was not rain gear at all. By the time we had pulled our nets in a record breaking 2 hours I was soaked to the skin. Luckily I got back to Pinawa by 11 in the morning and got dry clothes on and ended up going home for the weekend.
This week I have yet again switched projects. Our project supervisor from the juvenile project is gone for a month to tie up some loose ends before the students arrive. The new project I have been assigned to is with adult sturgeon. Sounds exciting, I know.
Monday we went out in the pouring rain again and only caught 2 sturgeon in one of our nets. one was too small and the other was just big enough for our research.
Today, instead of setting and pulling our own nets we joined up with some people from Manitoba Hydro. Or atleast I think they are from hydro.. But they are netting adults anyway so we just help with their nets, let them do their thing and then we do our thing. It seems my Aunty Shelley is a bit of a celebrity out this way as I am sometimes introduced to people as "Shelley Matkowski's neice". So far it has worked out pretty well and she seems to have a pretty good reputation. haha. (and aunty, I will try and keep up the good reputation haha).
We are working with Ken Kansas and a summer student named Matt. ( I think it is "ken" it might be "kent", but Imentioned this because I know aunty shelley and mom know him from numerous things). They are nice guys and it was a great day. I believe we will be working with these guys for a while.
The rest of the week is supposed to be rain, which is a bummer because unless there is lightning, we still have to go out. haha. But my mom was nice enough to take me shopping for new rain gear so I have officially stayed dry thus far. Here's hoping for good weather.
This week I have yet again switched projects. Our project supervisor from the juvenile project is gone for a month to tie up some loose ends before the students arrive. The new project I have been assigned to is with adult sturgeon. Sounds exciting, I know.
Monday we went out in the pouring rain again and only caught 2 sturgeon in one of our nets. one was too small and the other was just big enough for our research.
Today, instead of setting and pulling our own nets we joined up with some people from Manitoba Hydro. Or atleast I think they are from hydro.. But they are netting adults anyway so we just help with their nets, let them do their thing and then we do our thing. It seems my Aunty Shelley is a bit of a celebrity out this way as I am sometimes introduced to people as "Shelley Matkowski's neice". So far it has worked out pretty well and she seems to have a pretty good reputation. haha. (and aunty, I will try and keep up the good reputation haha).
We are working with Ken Kansas and a summer student named Matt. ( I think it is "ken" it might be "kent", but Imentioned this because I know aunty shelley and mom know him from numerous things). They are nice guys and it was a great day. I believe we will be working with these guys for a while.
The rest of the week is supposed to be rain, which is a bummer because unless there is lightning, we still have to go out. haha. But my mom was nice enough to take me shopping for new rain gear so I have officially stayed dry thus far. Here's hoping for good weather.
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
I got my first battle wound today. I was holding a juvenile sturgeon but only had a glove on my left hand so when the sturgeon suddenly flipped around, my first response was to grab it with my other hand. Sadly, my hand caught the sharp spikes on the side of the fish and my right palm now has to gashes in it. Though really they are pretty small cuts, but they did bleed a bit and hurt if I push on them the wrong way. oh well. It just makes me tougher.
I had this weekend off and Monday I switched from netting juvenile sturgeon to setting drift traps. The drift traps go in around this time of year to catch any baby sturgeon which have just hatched from eggs and are being flushed downstream. So Monday we took 8 drift traps and set them just downstream of slave falls. We then went up to slave falls for lunch, but found that the spill gates had been opened up alot and there was some pretty large waves around. We went into shore and were told that the water level was going to get higher so we shouldn't set anymore drift traps.
Before we headed home, we had to move one of the VRAP buoys that had floated downstream. This meant dragging the huge buoy into the boat, driving up closer to the slave falls generating station itself and putting the buoy back in the water. After some tricky work and a slightly scary moment or two because of such fast moving water and large waves, the buoy was good to go and we were headed back for home.
After all of that yesterday we got back but weren't sure what we were going to do today because we didn't want to set drift traps if the water was going to get higher because then the buoys don't have enough rope and things get more complicated. Last night though I got called and they told me I would be back working with the juvenile sturgeon project again while they figured out what to do with the drift traps. So I have now jumped crews again and will be continuing with the netting of juvenile sturgeon.
I am also pretty tired today since I have been in the sun all day and I didn't get to bed until late last night after I had watched Pittsburgh finally beat Detroit in the 3rd overtime period 4-3. But because of that, I am happy tired.
I had this weekend off and Monday I switched from netting juvenile sturgeon to setting drift traps. The drift traps go in around this time of year to catch any baby sturgeon which have just hatched from eggs and are being flushed downstream. So Monday we took 8 drift traps and set them just downstream of slave falls. We then went up to slave falls for lunch, but found that the spill gates had been opened up alot and there was some pretty large waves around. We went into shore and were told that the water level was going to get higher so we shouldn't set anymore drift traps.
Before we headed home, we had to move one of the VRAP buoys that had floated downstream. This meant dragging the huge buoy into the boat, driving up closer to the slave falls generating station itself and putting the buoy back in the water. After some tricky work and a slightly scary moment or two because of such fast moving water and large waves, the buoy was good to go and we were headed back for home.
After all of that yesterday we got back but weren't sure what we were going to do today because we didn't want to set drift traps if the water was going to get higher because then the buoys don't have enough rope and things get more complicated. Last night though I got called and they told me I would be back working with the juvenile sturgeon project again while they figured out what to do with the drift traps. So I have now jumped crews again and will be continuing with the netting of juvenile sturgeon.
I am also pretty tired today since I have been in the sun all day and I didn't get to bed until late last night after I had watched Pittsburgh finally beat Detroit in the 3rd overtime period 4-3. But because of that, I am happy tired.
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