Volunteers on teams 4, 5, and 6 certainly had the pleasure of meeting one of our HSBC fellows from Malta: Celine, Robert and Eugene all came from this small island in the Mediterranean to make a big contribution to our efforts in Monterey. As part of their fellowship, they must spreak the word about their adventure to their colleagues and community. Below are some excepts from the write-up they submitted to HSBC Malta and their local media.

"2006 was the final year of this five-year Partnership with Earthwatch. During these years, 2000 HSBC employees worldwide, together with experienced scientists, worked as field assistants on international research projects. The objective of these expeditions was to give employees the opportunity to make an active contribution to a conservation research project and to the environment in general. Three Maltese employees, namely Celine Schranz, Robert Mallia and Eugene Schembri were selected as volunteers to participate on one particular project in Monterey, California, USA The Marine Mammals of Monterey Bay Project. The expeditions took place between August and October, and seven different teams where involved. This participation was possible thanks to the full sponsorship, and as part of HSBC’s global Corporate Social Responsibility. This project laid particular emphasis on Bottlenose Dolphins and Sea Otters. Each expedition lasted ten days, and teams were made up of around 6-10 people from all over the globe. "
...
"On a particular day, Robert’s team was out at the field at 05:30am to observe the different behaviour patterns at different times of the day. In fact initially they counted the number of Sea Otters in the Slough, which in those early hours amounted to about 80, but which by noon had reduced to 45. Such observation revealed that after sunrise Sea otters move, either out in the Ocean or up towards Elkhorn Slough. Celine’s team on the contrary carried out a survey at dusk till late at night. At this point all otters gathered all in one raft and most of them were just resting. The same team, as well as Eugene’s team, also carried out an “Otter Census” in the slough, with Tom Kiekhefer the chief surveyor on the census."
...
"Another interesting activity from Celine’s group was participating in a Coastal Clean Up Day at California’s Coastal State Beach. This Clean-Up Day was organized by the Ocean Conservancy, and the group agreed that it would benefit otters and dolphins. They were provided with two sets of bags- one for garbage and one for recyclables and they also took along a data sheet to keep track of select items that were found such as cigarette butts, food wrappers, boating materials etc. Along the beach, they encountered all types of debris, such as a few dead marine mammals which included a harbour seal and a very bloated sea lion. They also found lots of balloons, which are extremely harmful to marine wildlife. After 90 minutes of combing the beach, they turned in 25lbs of waste! Hopefully their efforts, combined with others across the California Coastline, made a significant impact in cleaning up the marine habitat."
...
"Robert and Eugene’s teams were quite lucky with a lot of Dolphin sightings. In fact on one particular day, they could observe more than 30 dolphins which were on either side of the boats. They kept them company for a long time with some bow riding and others surfing and milling. Both teams came across Humpback Whales just in front of their boats. "
...
"This opportunity was certainly an unforgettable experience for all the 3 Maltese participants. What could normally be enjoyed through TV documentaries was at an arm’s length, and a hands on experience. Moreover the chance of joining up other bank colleagues from all around the globe, and meeting other people with different cultures and backgrounds, but yet sharing the same environmental ambitions, was an opportunity in itself. Surely an experience that left an impact at a personal level which will encourage others to participate in and contribute the HSBC’s monetary grant towards Malta’s environmental projects."


Thank you, Robert, for submitting this for the blog!

Celine, Robert Eugene- we look forward to hearing about your community project!

Update from Daniela: (charts with data analysis to come- Anna)

Dear Teams,

The season is really over. The house has been locked, the staff is returning home from the field and there is lots and lots of work to do to analyze the data, summarize the information and, yes…prepare for next year. Our field season is starting again next August and will again run until the end of October. There will be some slight changes based on your observations, your comments and the evolution of the work as we get answers to some questions and move on to others. One big change is going to be the accommodations. Although Pacific Grove served us well as a base and I love the town, we would like to be closer to the field and to the animals so we decided to move to Pajaro Dunes Colony. You have seen it…from the boat: that funky line of houses right on the beach. Well, that will be our new base. The house is very nice and close to the beach…maybe not as big as the Pacific Grove one but certainly close to Moss Landing and the wildlife.

Peter has been driving back to Massachusetts with the car and the data. He will be home today. I was in Mexico where I attended a marine mammal conference and then in Florida where I attended another that was especially interesting because of the sea otter workshop which gave me a lot to think about. It was the perfect motivator to get me to look at some of our data from this summer. I looked at the 5-minute sampling intervals that you and the staff collected from the parking lot in Moss Landing throughout the day looking at the sea otter raft and the other otters around it. The story is not surprising but interesting. Most of the sea otters observed in Elkhorn Slough are juvenile males, which confirms that the slough is still a male area and one where juvenile males spend their maturing years waiting to move out and possibly become territorial males by competing with the current “kings of the harems”. Some of them will become harem holders and others will perish trying or will be confined to peripheral areas perhaps managing to sneak into a territory every once in a while and mate with a female while the boss is busy. The interesting question is: How many of these juveniles will actually become territorial males and how many will make it? There is no answer for now and pursuing the question will take some collaborative efforts with other researchers and more funding, but we are exploring this possibility.

In the meantime, back in the slough these animals spend most of their time resting in Area 2, in the large raft you have observed, and foraging (but not in Area 2). We are looking at the data for indications of where most of the foraging occurred. We know that the slough main channel on both sides of the highway bridge is an important foraging area; however, the open ocean just in front of Moss Landing seemed to be as important this year. Figure 1 gives you the frequency of occurrence of the behaviors you have observed in Area 2 through the summer (this is part of the data you have helped collect!). Sea otters rested 47% of their time, groomed 23%, interacted with one another 11%, moved in and out or within Area 2 9% of the time and only foraged 1% of the time in this area. Most of the foraging occurred outside of Area 2.

The largest numbers of otters in Area 2 were found early in the morning between 6 and 7 am, and the numbers varied widely throughout the day. However, the number of otters tended to decrease later in the morning, increase again around noon and decrease in the afternoon as animals went out to forage and use other areas of the slough or offshore. Knowing when otters rest is important. Disturbance of resting patterns by boats and people may affect their ability to recuperate in between energetically demanding foraging trips. When sea otters rest, they become dry and warm which saves them a lot of energy. When they are disturbed, they dive or roll and become wet, therefore consuming more calories to stay warm. Continuous disturbance may therefore have effects on their health as they need to forage longer hours to recuperate calories lost. By identifying times of day and locations of resting areas we can suggest to the public appropriate behaviors to ensure diminished disturbance. Our initial data are giving us a good clue. We are going to continue to test the hypotheses I just mention to figure out the costs of disturbance to sea otters. Thanks for your help in getting these results.

There is still much more data to analyze and I will keep you posted. I wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving (for Americans!) and a great Holiday season.

All the best

Daniela

Please be sure to scroll down to read more about our last few days in Monterey!

Anna J on the road:

It was very sad to leave the Monterey Bay area, but to my suprise, I caught another glimpse of our friendly cetaceans. It was a beautiful drive down Rt 1 and around Morro Bay we spotted dolphins in the surf!! I quickly pulled the car over, grabbed the camera and ran to the shore line for some photo ID. I couldn't get as close as we normally do in the Astirix (unless I decided to jump into the waves). But you never know, with Daniela or Shinae's careful eye, we might be able to identify these animals as our pals from Monterey!

In addition to the TUTRU, we also recorded MIRAN at Piedras Blancas and MENO at Morro Bay.

5 POINTS to the first past-team-member to leave a comment correctly identifying these marine mammal species with their species codes and common names!

A late night note from Anna:

Here we are, only a few hours before leaving good 'ol Willow St. I apologize for not updating the blog the past few days, it has been quite hectic packing up the project. Today we spent the day disassembling the office, backed up all of our data and then packed the project materials along with our personal belongings into the cars.

I want to thank every who has been involved in the project over the last three months:
Team 1- Anita, Carole, Lyman, Kat, Claire, Daniel
Team 2- Alison, Eriko, Miles, John, Elizabeth, Marjorie
Team 3- Ruth, Donna, Larry, Joanne, Paul
Team 4- Nick, Andy, Celine, Ashley, Gail, Tom
Team 5- Sarah, Jill, Lynn, Brian, Rania, Robert
Team 6- Larry, David, Bill, Eugene, Donna, Hiroko
Team 7- Alejandra, Renee, Renata, Angeli, Yee, Marie, Elfreida

Special thanks to Shinae, our student visitor on Team 5, Mark from the UK office who was our staff and risk assessment extrodinaire on Team 1, and Tom Kieckhefer, our guest scientist who helped us census the otters in the slough.

Of course, I can't forget the invaluable contributions of my fellow team leaders, Peter and Sean. These two guys were fantastic colleagues, as well as fabulous friends.

Last, but certainly not least, I must thank our two PIs Daniela and Tom. They were excellent leaders and mentors in the field. It was an honor as well as a pleasure to contribute to their research.

Is this the end??? NOT A CHANCE!!

Yes, it may be the end of the field season, but our team will continue to update the blog every week or two (beginning after I return to the Earthwatch office in mid-November). Please check back for reflections on the season, updates on the data and plans for next year! If you have anything to contribute, it is not too late. Please email me your reflections or a fun story from the field and I will post it!

Come August, the web log will be back in full swing, so every one can keep in touch and follow our progess into the second field season. OR....you can join us in the field in 2007!

Farewell for now,
Anna