August 11th, Dauphin Island and Bayou La Batre, Alabama
We are meeting Bill Walton, Assistant Professor, Auburn University Dept. of Fisheries & Allied Aquacultures at Auburn’s Shellfish Laboratory on Dauphin Island. We’ll be joining them on a trip to their field site in Bayou La Batre, AL (yup, like Forrest Gump) where I’ll be able to take samples of ‘non-impacted’ oysters (meaning no one has visibly seen oil here, and water samples came back oil free (although I’m not exactly sure when these tests were done)). Before we go, we get a tour of the hatchery and help Courtney, a grad student, finish up some oyster measurements. This is nerdy, but their calipers are so rad I have to mention them. They are electronic, waterproof, and today plugged into the computer so each measurement automatically gets put into a cell in a spreadsheet – amazing :). Anyway, the field site is gorgeous. There’s a lot of cool stuff going on here. They are looking at growth (various characteristics) and survivorship in oysters grown in four different gear types and Courtney is looking at the effects of ‘tumbling’ on these characteristics as well (see their facebook page for more information). Bill sends me into the water under the dock just along the marsh grass boundary to grab wild oysters for sampling. I’m the first in the water while the others are unloading the bags and I have to admit I’m a bit nervous about the stingrays we were just warned about. “Just shuffle your feet and you’ll be ok”. great. These oysters are intertidal, but with the tide today, I’m in water over my knees. After I lose 15 minutes digging around in the muck for the oyster knife I dropped, sampling goes really quickly (I think they may be easier to shuck than Pacifics). Then I walk down the dock and see my father (who can’t swim) up to his chest in water helping move the boat with the oyster bags to get them back on the lines. I’m proud :). We are shown oyster drills (not like ours, huge!), juvenile blue crabs (they have the cutest red armpits!) and some plastic debris that they are finding left over from the pom-pom booms used in the spill response efforts. It leads to a bit of a discussion regarding potential impacts of the clean-up efforts themselves. What will be the effect of the plastic debris left over from booms, increased foot traffic in sensitive ecosystems, use of dispersants, low salinity from dam releases? It’s an interesting point. We finish the afternoon helping Courtney fix floats on some of the bags. Then we eat some oysters. Very tasty and pretty for that matter. Amazing day. I heart Alabama.
-Mac
