Mud-luscious and puddle-wonderful
May 2020 through to the present
In March of 2020, I was sitting on the fourth floor of LSB, eating an orange, when my marine ecology professor, Dr. Jennifer Ruesink, sat down beside me and asked what I planned on doing that summer. It was the last day of in-person classes at UW, but I still assumed that spring quarter would come and life return to normal. On the stairs, later that day, I met Dr. Jon Herron, who told me he thought that that this coronavirus would be nothing like what his grandmother experienced in the Spanish flu, in a tone that implied he too thought the state was overreacting. That said, I had already been rather unsure of what my summer break would look like - an internship? an REU? some globe-trotting? - so the added uncertainty of an exciting new disease made me chary of too much planning. In short, I said I had no idea. This was the right thing to say, evidently, because Jennifer then offered me a job as a field and lab tech for her, starting in May or June and going however long, paid in real money rather than university credits. Even at the time, I was stupefied by the fact that I got a job by eating lunch in a conspicuous location. Working for the Ruesink Lab is perhaps the best thing that could have happened to me in 2020 without breaking the laws of reality. I learned oodles of new skills, got my hands dirty doing research, finally began to understand how academic papers work, and made connections with excellent, interesting, passionate people. It is, in fact, the sort of experience I wanted out of college: some actual, practical knowledge of the field I would like to make my career in. I could not have ended up in that fourth floor LSB lounge without the opportunities I was given by so many other mentors and guides, who were good enough to take me under their wings when I was a horribly incompetent newbie who liked gawking at flowers, but I remain immensely grateful to Jennifer in particular. Her lab gave me a wonderful kind of work during some of the weirdest years in living memory. Note: title quote is from [in Just-] by e.e. cummings, taken from the wall of Jen's garage. |
Where we were
Willapa Bay is a large, shallow bay in southwestern Washington, a little north of the Columbia River mouth. It's full of shoals and tideflats exposed twice or so a day, with a long low spit travelling north as its outer boundary and wooded, rolling hills run through with wide tidal rivers to its east. Driving down 101 in the evening, one sees the salt marshes gold-gray between the dark hemlock forests, with mist curling off the water or out of the trees. We often worked before the dawn, on clear mornings, rainy mornings, mornings where the fog lay thick and the sun shone through in phantom white. Sturgeons flipped themselves out of the water. Oyster farms lined every tidal surface, with a few native oyster stragglers clinging on here and there.
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Oyster farms have been in Willapa Bay for generations. The tribes around its edges harvested native oysters for centuries, and the first white settlers mimicked them, before trying to introduce an East Coast species for commercial farming. That one died out, taking a good chunk of the native oysters with it, and was replaced by the wildly successful Japanese Pacific oyster, which now grows feral throughout the bay. Past decades have seen declines in the oyster harvests coming out of the bay, although I am assured they are still excellent, and growers usually blame this on a native pest, the ghost shrimp. Ghost shrimp aerate the soil, making it porous and causing objects on the surface, like oysters, to sink down and drown in the mud. Traditionally, liberal use of pesticides has kept their numbers down, but environmental concerns lead to stricter use in Washington. One possible solution lies in native eelgrass, which may keep shrimp out by rooting in the sand. Alternatively, oysters could just be doing poorly due to global climate change, in which case banishing shrimp will be no help whatsoever.
What we did
I've worked on several projects over the past year or so, some more than others. Each took place on or near an oyster farm, usually the sort where oysters lie scattered around like clumps of broken glass through the mud. (I have cut myself on them numerous times.) Generally, the low tides were given over to hard work out on the tideflats, coring for shrimp, transplanting eelgrass, or setting up experiments, while afternoons were spent constructing a shower, measuring sampled eelgrass and shrimp, or reading a book and playing Bananagrams. In Seattle, I go into LSB every now and then and weigh various things.
There are three big projects going on presently: one, led by Wes, a transplant experiment to see if shrimp and eelgrass are competitors; two, led by Elena from Marine Ecology, shrimp sampling on oyster beds; and three, led by Jen, a long-term study comparing perennial and annual eelgrass. Honestly, just ask me for details if you're interested. You probably have my contact info if you're looking at this website, and if you don't, oh well. |
What's going on now
The battle between growers and shrimp continues apace. I hang around LSB and process sediment samples in the Dirt Room for Wes. On Fridays, I do crosswords with some folks from Marine Ecology, and in a few weeks we'll head out to Willapa for spring sampling.
Honors has some rules about "experiential learning," so below you can find my application and reflection on my time with the Ruesink Lab.
Honors has some rules about "experiential learning," so below you can find my application and reflection on my time with the Ruesink Lab.
Header image: myself and two teammates, Nahcotta Harbor, WA, June or July 2020. Description: three people in waders, buffs, baseball caps, and life vests walk towards the camera, holding dirty buckets. Behind them is an immense pile of gray-white oyster shells.