Being a Journey Across the Border

The Canadian border, that is.

Team Animal Behavior departed for British Columbia on Tuesday night. The flights landed in Seattle at 5:30 AM, but there was no rest even then. The car had to be picked up (a monstrous Jeep, the only thing that could fit all the luggage) and it was a three-hour drive over the border to the ferry which would take us to Vancouver Island. Well, needless to say we were all very tired, but there were fish to collect and lakes to explore, so we could not be stopped! The following day saw us traveling to Sproat Lake to collect females for color observations.
On the way, though, we had a chance to stop at the Cathedral Forest.

It's an amazing place. The trees are immense and almost everything is smothered in drooping moss. The ground is covered in large ferns and the whole place feels primeval, like something time forgot. I like to think of it as Jurassic Park, minus the dinosaurs.

The trees are quite big. This one was over 500 ft tall.

Sproat Lake was very nice, despite being cold. The females there are very pretty. There was one that was gold and iridescent. Unfortunately, we came a bit early in the mating season to see much. About all we could see were some very eager males, some who would court with anything that moved.

Today was an early start so we could do Crystal Lake before access to it was shut off. The lake is in the middle of a partly clear-cut forest, but it's still lovely, and we were much more successful today than anticipated (35 captured males. Susan is tireless).

Tomorrow is another early start to catch an early ferry off the island. Hoo boy.

-Joshua

Being an Expedition to Seward

Yesterday was an early start for the animal behavior group. We had a two and a half hour drive to Seward and Resurrection Bay planned to catch some fish! Along the way, we stopped many times to take pictures of beautiful Cook Inlet and the mountains.
As we drove it began to get colder. We must have been getting higher into the mountains, because there was snow everywhere. Snow. In June.

It was a strange thing to see, but this is why they call it the Great White North!

When we finally arrived in Seward we had to do a bit of off-road driving to get to the lakes. Ponds, more like. We were looking at a large group of ponds in the middle of a large muddy field filled with knee-high grass. My boots and pants were covered in mud and pollen after walking around. The scenery was great though, even though we had to listen to the sounds of seagulls and crows screaming at each other.

After lunch we got to work. Traps were laid to catch fish for our crosses and the equipment to measure color was set up. Lily manned the color station while the rest of us patrolled the edges of the pond, nets in hand, searching for courting and parental males. When the sun came out from behind the clouds, this was an easy task; the pond was shallow and the water clear, and in the sunlight we could see straight to the bottom. The males were brightly-colored and most were guarding nests built into the muskeg-y bottom. Watching them was a fascinating experience. Reading about courtship behavior is one thing. It's quite another to see it in action, to watch the males chase off rival males, to see the males and females dance about each other, to observe how diligently the males guard their nests and just-hatched fry. Watching multiples males and multiple interactions on a large scale was somewhat dizzying, but gave me a new appreciation for the stickleback mating process.

During our day we had a visitor! A woman walking her dogs saw us gathering specimens and asked about the threespine stickleback. She was treated to the full explanation of our purpose and the evolutionary significance of the fish. She seemed quite interested. It's nice to know that locals want to learn more about the work we do here.And her dogs were very friendly.

There's also nothing quite like cold pizza for lunch during field work. Mmm-mmm.

-Joshua

Alicia and Colin – Going Rogue. Sort of.

After our fifth day in Alaska we are still not used to the lack of darkness! Our typical Alaskan day starts at eight in the morning, the sun just rising from its laze on the horizon; it never fully sets! Our first full day was extremely busy, with setting and collecting traps from ten different lakes. Fortunately, the last lake of the day, Echo Lake, made up for the “redonculousness” of the hard day’s work with the set of rope swings we found on the shore. Of course our next most logical course of action was to come back the next day for a quick swim.

Later in the week we discovered what the Alaskan natives call “muskeg”, the swampy marshes that surround the massive amount of lakes in the region. Colin discovered that the muskeg is a force to be reckoned with; he fell into Finger Lake after his first few steps in the muskeg. Luckily he was wearing waders and didn’t get too wet.

Yesterday happened to be Matt “Dr. Wund”’s over-the-hill birthday which we celebrated with a colorful hamburger and fries cake. (He isn’t actually over the hill…yet).

Earlier in the day we managed to collect and set traps at a multitude of other lakes, leaving us tired and in need of some late afternoon fun. We were strolling through a Sportsman’s Warehouse in search of a raincoat for Alicia when Dani noticed some neon orange fisherman’s pants, after which she said to us “hold my stuff I’m going to try this on and you’re going to take pictures”. Needless to say we ended with another good day.

Our next project involves dissecting male stickleback to make crosses for the Clark lab in home base Worcester. We had a successful learning day today and plan to spend all of tomorrow fertilizing about 80 clutches to be shipped home in the next few days.