By Nikki King, Oceanlab, University of Aberdeen

Dry land!  Our first view of it since the 1st August and what a nice piece it was.  Bantry Bay is a very pretty place off the SW coast of Ireland and gave us the perfect hiding place from the weather outside, and for conducting the EK60 calibration.

Bantry Bay

The foredeck and the view of Bantry Bay.

The poor St Andrews team had to be up at 3:00 am to start the calibration procedure, which basically involves dangling a tungsten ball with some glamorised fishing rods under the ship in the view of the acoustic gear, and then imaging it with sound.  The sphere acts as a standard with which you can compare the data collected during the cruise.

The calibration winches.

Whilst we were still in Bantry Bay it was decided that it would be a good opportunity for the cruise photo.  This is when Monty, the PI, attempts to get as many people together as possible for a cruise team photo.  We had the normal standard cruise image and then went for a few variations!  Judge for yourself which one is the better photo!

JC037 scientists and crew

Gavin's idea of a good cruise photo!

Science Ho!

We also had some distinguished guests take part in the team photo, the founding members of the “BEARD” society.  Being the primadonnas that they are, they demanded a personal photo shoot with bearded photographer, David Shale, to get the cover image for their new book “Facial Hair: it’s not just for cruises”.  The foreword will be written by Peter Bray who is also a fan of facial decoration and sports an impressive beard himself.  It’ll be out in paperback (RRP 99p) at your local Nisa Supermarket for Christmas, and in the bargain bin by New Year.

David Shale, the bearded photographer, awaits the arrival of BEARD

"Facial hair: it's not just for cruises"

The calibration went very well, due to the hard work of the St Andrews team and the ship’s crew, and was completed by lunchtime.  The team were rewarded with a drill in the lifeboat with Matt, Vanessa and Steve.  Once this was complete it allowed us to leave Bantry Bay and set sail for Falmouth early.

Dr Cox, the sweaty fox, on board the lifeboat with Vanessa, Matt, Steve and John.

This will be my last cruise as the ECOMAR post-doc, as I am leaving for pastures new after this cruise.  I’d just like to say that I’ve had a really enjoyable 3 years working on this project, and an excellent series of cruises.  Out of them all though, and I’m not just saying this for effect, this one has been the most fun!  So, I wish everyone from the RRS James Cook JC037 cruise all the best for their respective futures, as I say “adieu”…

TTFN

By Gary Robinson, University of Newcastle

Day 37 onboard the RRS James Cook and the sight of land is only a matter of hours away. As we approach Bantry Bay, SW Ireland to complete the return leg of EK60 calibrations there are mixed feelings onboard as things are being drawn to a close. Anticipation of setting foot on dry land contrasts heavily with the disappointment of our time at sea coming to an end.

Today the general weather conditions are pretty grumpy with thick grey clouds overhead and a stiff blow kicking up the seas into a decent sized swell. The weather has struggled to deviate from this throughout the trip but despite hurricane Bill, it has been relatively ‘research friendly’ providing extended periods of workable conditions.

After the RPC (Request the Presence of your Company) last night, an evening to celebrate and discuss both the successes and struggles of the cruise, the scientists appeared from their cabins in dribs and drabs. At 12.30 there was a science meeting during which, talks were presented on the benthic research carried out during the cruise. Thomas Linley (Oceanlab) presented a snapshot of the 83GB of data (15,751 images) using time series from the PAL lander to highlight the main trends in species response time to a mackerel bait.

You’ve been framed!

Jessica Craig (Oceanlab) presented her results on bioluminescence of deep sea animals with some video footage of Ostracod bioluminescence. Nikki King (Oceanlab) then presented an analysis of the OTSB trawl fish data we collected during the trip. Over all sites, 6 successful trawls were produced, we processed 1455 demersal fish, which amounted to 282kg of fish, numerous different species, a handful of extremely rare species (including 1 Neocyema sp. which is 1 of only 5 specimens caught worldwide) and a partridge in a pear tree.

From there Alan Hughes (National Oceanography Centre), Claudia Alt (National Oceanography Centre) and Holly Bik (National History Museum) presented the preliminary results from their work on the benthic invertebrates collected in both the OTSB trawls and megacores. Throughout the trip a great number of invertebrates were tirelessly sieved, sorted and identified before key morphometric characteristics were taken and the samples set in Formalin to preserve for further analysis back in the lab. Finally, Will Reid (Newcastle) talked over his work in using stable isotope analysis of invertebrate tissue to determine energy flows through the benthic foodwebs.

As we steam back, with the majority of equipment stored and ready for demobilisation the scientists struggle for sources of entertainment in between the hours or data analysis, project proposals and frantic emailing.
Now into the 3rd day of the RRS James Cook Beard Fest, the team of 5 (Myself-Barry Simpson, Gavin Tilstone, Ben Wigham, Will Reid and Rob Simpson) representing ‘BEARD’ (British Environmentalist’s Against Revealing Derma) set upon the Mexican look with a fine drop cut to chin moustache. A perfect way to approach the Chilli con carne on the menu this evening.

The five amigo's: Game of lizard snatching anyone?

This is to be followed by a Lord of the Rings extended edition marathon – 12 hours of film between 7pm and 7am and a lot of coffee. Perfect timing to see Martin Cox and his team start the long and tedious job of calibrating the EK60 echosounders….good luck with the 1973 Shakespeare beachcaster setup guys.

By Susan Evans, PERG, University of St Andrews

Today was a really nice sunny day onboard the James Cook! We definitely haven’t seen many of these since coming to sea. The first of 3 scientific meetings took place after lunch, whereby each group present’s their preliminary findings from this cruise to the rest of the scientific party. Today was the turn of the primary production group consisting of Gavin (sporting a rather fetching beard, more on the beard later), Victor and Alex who were joined by the Pelagic Ecology Group from St Andrews. Following these talks most people were busy packing away their equipment and sorting things out in preparation for our arrival at Falmouth. Martin, Tom and I spent the rest of the afternoon preparing the calibration winches for tomorrow’s calibration of the EK-60 scientific echosounder at Bantry Bay. This proved to be very frustrating, with several technical difficulties… The gear we will be using is basically 3 fishing rods which will suspend a tungsten sphere under the ship. The sphere will then hopefully be detected on the EK-60 control computer screen without too much trouble.

The calibration winches for the EK60 calibration.

Away from the science… and onto the ‘Beard Society’. Since the beginning of the cruise 5 guys: Will, Ben, Rob, Gary and Gavin have relentlessly been growing their beards, and now as we approach land their beards are being gradually shaved off with a new design each day (5 deisgns over 5 days). I gained an exclusive interview with Will who informed me that it’s not actually so easy to grow a beard and the week of itchiness requires inner strength to persevere on through.

The Beard Society, from left to right, Rob Simpson, Will Reid, Ben Wigham, Gavin Tilstone and Barry Simpson.

Dinner was a special meal today and consisted of a starter of a seafood medley, individual Beef Wellingtons and an amazing chocolate fondue to follow. It was a great meal, and my compliments go to the chefs who have been up since very early this morning preparing the food. Great job guys!  This evening we are having the RPC (request the pleasure of your company) as a celebration of the end of the cruise. It should be a really nice evening – even better as Monty pays for it!

Beautiful sunset.

As we are nearing land, I decided to ask a few people onboard what were the best things about being at sea. Here are a couple of responses….

The wildlife

Seeing the amazing creatures that come up in the trawls

The proximity to nature

Being away from Manchester

Getting home again (Jimbo)

Feeling privileged to not have a nine to five job, and actually being here where many folk have never been.

The excellent food…

But, for me it’s been an amazing experience coming to sea for 5 weeks. I have really enjoyed it and it’s been great to see and be part of marine research first-hand.

By Tom Letessier, PERG, University of St Andrews

Hi all!

Today most scientists and crew have been busy with dismantling and general maintenance of the various bits of gear that have been used for scientific purposes. The Pelagic Ecology Research Team have, along with the Stig, been occupied with our beloved RMT (rectangular mid water trawl), and have spend most of morning taking it apart, and washing the many bolts, shackles, and screws. And believe me, it was a lot of bits that needed cleaning! At 1230 we had our first post-science meeting, where Monty told all science teams what to expect in the remaining week. Amongst other thing this was an opportunity for the scientist to comment on the general success of the cruise. Overall everybody was happy with the performance of the ship and crew.

The Stig leading the RMT dismantle.

Mmmmmmmmm, but can we put it back together again?!!

...it's looking less likely.

During safety drills. Martin was given special treatment during yesterday’s drill, and was even taken for a special military ‘interrogation’. Apart from this though, everything is fine…

Martin on his "special" SAS interrogation, courtesy of Peter Bray.

The weather has picked up a bit and but thankfully the waves are from the stern, so the ship does not rock much. We all feel excited about getting back to land after a long trip. The only element of anticipation is with respect to the calibration at Bantry bay in Ireland. We will be using brand new gear, and there will some insecurity involved in using the brand new fishing rods, used to dangle the calibration sphere under the hull. Finally a big happy birthday to Ben Wigham, who is turning the ripe age of 33 today.

Tom out

By Alan Hughes, NOCS

Today marked our last day at our Northeast site, and the last sampling of this cruise.  Work in the early hours of this morning began with a final Megacore deployment.  This was to take samples for Natasha and Holly to study tiny worms living in the sediment.  Noticeably, the cores here have a distinct brown layer at the surface, with grey mud below.  The brown layer may represent mud that has been deposited during the Holocene – the geological period that covers approximately the last 10,000 years, and represents the current warm period in the global climate.  If this is the case the sediment at the bottom of the cores could be over 20,000 years old.

The final Megacorer deployment returns 8 out of 8 perfect (and beautiful!) cores. The cores are 10 cm across.

Holly, Natasha and Tonya (left to right) in the Cold Room at 4 am, ready to start processing the cores. It was a long night.

After the coring, we recovered the Amphipod trap (or “Amphitrap”).  Amphipods are tiny (generally a few millimetres long) shrimp-like animals, which occur in huge numbers in the sea.  The Amphitrap attracts amphipods that feed on dead fish, and these tiny scavengers can reduce a dead fish down to its bones in less than a day.  The Amphitrap has been extremely successful onboard this cruise, with three deployments at the Southeast site, and two at each of the other three sites.  The animals caught in these traps will be carefully studied by Dr. Tammy Horton in Southampton.  There are currently more than 800 species of scavenging amphipods known to science, although the large number of species has resulted in some confusion.  These samples will be invaluable in helping to sort out the identification problems of these abundant animals, as well as determining the geographic range of many species.  As the mid-Atlantic ridge has been so poorly sampled, it’s also quite possible that Tammy will find new species from these samples.

The Amphitrap.

: Claudia holding a sieve containing fish bones and hundreds of tiny amphipods captured by the Amphitrap.

Close up photographs of two amphipods, both Eurythenes gryllus, a species which we found at all four sites. Although amphipods are generally very difficult to identify, this species grows up to about 7 cm long, making it easy to spot. We found it in a variety of colours, although the white ones were more common in our samples.

After all the landers were safely onboard we took some last water samples, then just before lunch we set sail for Falmouth with the wind and the sea behind us.  Our day didn’t end there, however, as in the afternoon we had a safety drill.  After the General Alarm sounded, all the scientists and technicians mustered on the back deck.  We then split into pairs, with one person in each pair being blindfolded.  The blindfolded person then had to walk back to his cabin, with the other person making sure that they didn’t trip over anything, or fall down the stairs, etc.  The pairs swapped roles then made their way back onto the aft deck.  This drill is to make sure that people would be able to find their way of the ship if there was a power cut or if the ship was full of smoke.  This was actually quite good fun, and made an enjoyable end to the working day.

: Jess and Pedro looking surprisingly happy at 6 am. They worked all night carrying out experiments to study the bioluminescence of small animals such as the amphipods recovered in the Amphitrap.

The PAL lander is welcomed back on deck.

Scientists muster on the back deck for the safety drill.

By Andy Olivier, SAMS

Today is the penultimate day of science on the Cook. The day was filled in with the deployment of landers in the morning, a CTD and an optics cast was carried out by Victor.  The majority of the day was spent RMTing, Martin keeping an eye on the depth of the nets and pressing the big button that changes the nets.
I aim to digress somewhat from the science for my blog today however, but, I do promise in a roundabout way to get back to it.  When thinking about what I wanted to write for my blog, someone suggested interviewing Peter Bray, our guest rower  on the ship for the final three weeks.  Once I had tracked him down, I managed to get him to agree to an interview. Armed with pencil and notepad I headed to the bar and met up with him and began the questioning, once I realised he wasn’t going to just tell me everything.

Peter Bray left school and joined a supermarket chain and was being trained as a trainee manager. It was at this time he realised how boring he found this and that jobs sitting at desks, or jobs where it was 9-5, were just not for him.  He decided to join the military and became an instructor at an early age due to his enthusiasm. After doing this for a while however he became bored again. In an effort to find a path in the military where he would avoid the boredom which ailed him, he decided he should apply to the top of the totem pole as such.
He applied to join the SAS and was then ‘beasted’ for six months, the training taking place in both the Brecon Beacons, the SAS’ favourite playground in Wales. Here the SAS supplicants are given time limits and packs and have to travel between locations.  A portion of time is given to preparation and training before a final four weeks of beasting which occurs before the testing week.  One of the tasks is an eighty mile distance which has to be completed within a twenty two hour period. This is with a 55lbs pack plus his weapon and then a what is known as belt kit – a belt to carry additioanl water and food, which does not count towards the 55lbs.
When he passed the selection process, upon finding out that he was a keen kayaker and swimmer, he was put into Boat troop, the section of the SAS who specialise in the use of boats and diving to carry out their jobs.  Fast forwarding somewhat, Peter left the military after twenty four years.  The last fifteen years of this was in the SAS.

After leaving the military Peter set up an outdoor company which did everything from Canyoning, Caving, Kayaking, White water rafting, etc. However, due to an incident during this time at another outdoor centre, a lot of paperwork was created to insure accidents wouldn’t happen. It meant that most of Peter’s time became taken up with doing paperwork and hiring staff to take people out to do the activities, rather than going out himself. Getting bored with this he decided enough was enough and went freelance as an Outdoor instructor.
For a time he taught outdoor education at Pen-coed college, when he was invited to London by a friend to meet another friend. This trip was actually a job interview, in the end Pete was hired but his friend wasn’t!!!
The job was close protection,ie body guarding, for the British Embassy and for gas and oil engineers in Baghdad. He went out and did this from 2004 to 2009.  Eventually he was invited to join a team of sixteen who protected a  two star American generals. The only  way to join this protection team was by recommendation and invite!
When he isn’t living this far from boring lifestyle, Peter keeps busy on the water. In 2001 he kayaked across the North Atlantic solo and unsupported.  Three years ago Peter was part of a team of four rowers who were rowing across the Atlantic. They were hit by hurricane Alex off of the coast of Cornwall and the boat was ripped in half.  A year after this another team succeeded.
Rob Munslow was part of this team and he later rowed across the North Atlantic solo.  It turned out later that a yacht had given Rob Munslow equipment halfway across. Peter felt that this broke the theory of an unassisted crossing, but it’s not actually against the rules. He decided to undertake the challenge and do it himself without resorting to receiving equipment halfway through.
The boat he would use, Black Knight, was custom made and a lot of planning and thought went into the design of the boat.  During his row his biggest problem was the fog, at some points it would sit five miles off, but at other times it would close in cutting off all vision. At times like this, Peter would head inside the cabin and keep an eye on the radar.  As news of hurricane Bill increased and the threat it posed escalated discussions started with his onshore team  about cancelling his attempt.

Black Knight

At the time of the pick up the RRS James Cook was battling waves  between five to six metres in height, and the wind was gusting at thirty to forty miles per hour, not a pleasant place to be. With conditions already like this and the weather reports saying that it was going to worsen, the onshore team and and Peter made the decision to cancel the attempt.

Peter is hoping to get his boat back after it is receovered, as it is currently floating in the Atlantic.  When asked if he would go again he paused, considered and then said “yes”.  Whilst not a failure, as the weather conditions were too severe, Peter still sees it as such and so he will do it again.

Peter Bray, still smiling, immediately after rescue.

Finding himself upon the James Cook with its hard rations of a three course dinner and more food than the scientists seem able to eat (despite some valiant attempts by some) and with his own cabin, Peter see’s how things could be a lot worse.  The downside of his rescue is that he is stuck with us for three weeks, until we make port in Falmouth. In his own words, this has been an educational turn of events, he had had no idea that money was being put into marine research. Since being onboard he has watched the moorings being recovered and deployed, landers, trawls and seen the dissections of fish.
When I asked him, “What was the most interesting part of the science that he had seen?” Peter replied that it was the scientists and the enthusiasm in which they worked. The day we pulled in the trawl full of mud he was impressed with the way that the teams just jumped in with shovels and hands, grins on their faces and laughter coming as they got on with it. Als, he has been impressed with the way  the scientists have answered his questions about what they were doing and have aways been happy to explain exactly what was going on.

See I told you I would bring it back to the science eventually.

A good evening all.

By Pedro Ribeiro, IMAR-DOP, University of Azores.

Sailing out here on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge can be a very solitary affair. Day after day we look outside in search of anything that can assure us that we’re not alone in the ocean. Alas, for weeks nothing emerged above the horizon, and I was beginning to lose hope. Today, however, we spotted one cargo ship just a few miles away. So far this was the closest experience I’ve had to a mirage because, after all this time seeing nothing but water all around, I guess my brain got used to it, and for a few seconds I just couldn’t believe my eyes. Strange feeling…
Ever since we crossed the sub-polar front, we’ve been surrounded day and night by many sea birds. Fulmars, shearwaters, kittiwakes, skuas and other species are constantly showing off their flight skills up in the skies or zigzagging between the waves. Many of our winged friends usually stay at a reasonable distance from the ship, but the more audacious ones keep flying by to have a look, and a few of them even venture landing on deck, while people on-board attempt some sort of interaction.

Gary attempting to feed a pair of kittiwakes, who didn’t trust the human or just weren’t too fond of fish liver.
For some people the first day of September started long before sunrise.  The OTSB had been running since midnight when, at 4 A.M., it had to be interrupted due to wire jumping off the A frame block sheave. As a result, the catch was very small, consisting only of seven unfortunate fish, which Nikki promptly processed. After such an exciting start to her day, with the adrenaline still pumping and lots of time on her hands before breakfast, Nikki went on to watch the movie “Blades of Glory”. We definitely can’t say this has been a wasted dawn.
Next up was the deployment of the megacorer around 5 A.M.  Now, I have to express my admiration for everyone involved in this task. For some reason, megacoring always happens during the night or just before dawn, when the chilling wind and the pitch black scenery are most effective at making us long for our warm cabin. Luckily, after the gear is recovered, it is possible to find shelter in the cold room (kept at 4 °C), where the sediment is processed. Because all good things come to an end, soon it is time to leave the cold room, because the upper layer of sediment that is brought up in the core tubes has to be sieved under flowing water in a cozy corner of the aft deck. Another successful coring session was thus completed, and soon afterwards Alan, Holly, Natasha and Tonya were able to warm up with a hot cup of tea.

Recovery of the northeast mooring started at 8 A.M. with pleasant weather and calm sea. The unusually good conditions were more than welcome, since things always work out better when there is no need to battle against the elements. After pulling in two sediment traps, several current meters and many floats, the whole procedure had to be repeated, this time in the opposite direction, with the release of a new mooring which will be recovered in 2010. Deployment of the mooring was done swiftly, and soon after 3 P.M. Victor and the crew were able to cast the optics rig for another measurement of the inherent optical properties of the water.

Recovery of the mooring started at sunrise and went on through most of the day.

After dinner both PAL and ICDeep landers were retrieved in record-breaking time and were soon being serviced in the hanger. The two baited traps mounted on the ICDeep lander came up full of amphipods, giving Jess and I the opportunity to win the breakfast challenge. All the amphipods had to be sorted and tested for bioluminescence as quickly as possible, because they cannot survive for long at the surface. Under the tyranny of a stopwatch, batch after batch all the amphipods were tested and occasionally there were fireworks to be seen.

Securely harnessed, Thom pulls the ICDeep lander onto the deck, and releases it from the mooring line.

After a long night of experiments, it’s time for a drink.

Science will be over in two days, and after that we’re steaming towards land and our loved ones. It’s been a long and tiring journey, and therefore everyone is looking forward to disembark and head home. Since this is the last time I’m doing the blog I just want to say that this cruise has been a fantastic and very rewarding experience for me. The first of many more to come, I hope. Thanks, everyone!

By Martin Cox, PERG, University of St Andrews

I have swapped blog days with Susan because I had hoped to once again write about the safety drill, but there was no drill.  The marine crew certainly keep us on our toes.  Who knows when the next safety drill will be?  Matt, the chief-officer, informed me that when it happens the next drill will be about “situation awareness”, very intriguing.

We arrived at the northeast study site in the early hours of the morning (54° N 34° W).  The sea was quite rough and the wind was blowing at 40 knots.  We had planned to turn around a long-term seabed mooring, but the rough seas made this impossible. Instead the pelagic group from St Andrews University carried out an acoustic survey using the EK-60 scientific echosounder.

We started the EK-60 survey just after breakfast.  The ship steamed up and down ten line transects, each was 8 nautical miles long, arranged in a grid design (shown in the plan-view picture below).  Previously we carried out identical surveys at the other three stations.

Line transect survey design.

Each of the 10 line transects is shown as a black line.  The ship’s track is shown as a green line – the ship was about one-third of the way along line number two when the above screen shot was taken.  Despite the rough conditions all the officers managed to steer the ship in a straight line along the transects.  Matt (chief-officer) completed the best between-transect turn.  He received top marks for a symmetrical turn that only took 6 minutes, instead of the usual 10.

During the EK-60 survey we detected some interesting acoustic scattering layers.  Below there are two acoustic pictures, or echograms, from the 18 and 38 kHz transducer frequencies.  There are between-acoustic frequency differences in the vertical structure of the layers caused by layers being formed by different zooplankton species.

In additional to the echosounder surveys we also collect samples from the water column using a rectangular mid-water trawl (RMT).  The version the RMT that we are using has 6 nets that can be opened and closed remotely via underwater acoustic commands sent from an operator onboard the ship.  The picture below shows the RMT being lowered into the water from the A-frame at the aft of the ship.

RMT

Unfortunately the electronics that control our pelagic net malfunctioned.  The electronics are housed in waterproof tube, shown in the picture below, and are used to record the depth and speed of the net through the water and open and close the nets.  The malfunction means that we are unable to open and close the nets.  We are hopeful that with the help of Southampton based engineers, the Stig and Jon will be able to repair the net electronics.

RMT bottle.

By Rebecca Hunter, University of Glasgow

Today was the final trawl at the NW station and the third day of continuous fish processing.  It’s interesting to see the difference in the catch now we have moved north; most striking is the huge abundance of the grenadier Coryphaenoides brevibarbis.  So after collecting hundreds of these fish in the past 48 hours, it seemed appropriate to dedicate my blog entry to them.

Coryphaenoides brevibarbis, rat-tail.

This species is found in the Atlantic Ocean at depths of 1700 – 4300 m and they are quite small compared with most other rattails.  They are demersal, which means they generally live just off the bottom, and have a diet based on crustaceans.  We dissect out the stomachs which can then be opened and the contents examined at a later date by poor, unsuspecting honours students.  Knowing what the fish eat can give us clues about their lifestyle.  For instance, a belly full of invertebrates that live in the mud indicates a bottom dwelling habit, or a diet change between juvenile and adult stages could mean a habitat shift with age.  Fish also differ in their food selection; some eat anything they can find, where as others are more fussy.

We also remove the otoliths from the head.  These are tiny bones in the ear that act to maintain balance and position.  When these structures are cut open rings can be seen, like the rings in a tree trunk, which can be counted to determine the age of the fish.  To do this, the otolith must be embedded and cut into very thin sections (less than 1 mm).  These sections are then viewed under a microscope where patterns of light and dark rings are visible.  There have been numerous studies on shallow-water fish to show that these rings represent fast growth periods (light areas) and slow growth periods (dark areas) due to the seasons of the year.  Therefore, one light area and one dark area are counted as one year in the life of the fish.  Although fish living in the deep ocean are not directly affected by the seasons, scientists believe there are delayed seasonal patterns in these regions influenced by the waters above.

Removing the otoliths stage 1...

...removing the otoliths, stage 2.

A section from a C. brevibarbis otolith, age 11.

I looked at the otoliths from this species last year and found an age range on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge from 1 – 13 years.  Again, unlike many other rattails, this is quite low.  The abyssal grenadier was aged up to 40 years and previous studies on the roundnose grenadier had a maximum age of 72!  Knowing the age of a fish can be used to calculate growth rates as well and this can give an indication of the amount of energy being supplied to the area.

Energy supply for scientists.

Fish gonads.

I have also been taking gonad samples to look at the reproductive biology on my return to dry land.  We haven’t come across any mature females with eggs yet but with another trawl planned at the NE station there are still hours of ‘brevi’ processing to come.  It’s funny to see the different ways people employ to keep themselves going on these long days.  A constant supply of fizzy drinks and chocolate hobnobs is not always enough, sometimes we need to break out the group huddle to revive ourselves.

Science.............

....HO!!!!!

By Holly Bik, PhD Student, The Natural History Museum, London

Well, we’ve only got a few more days of ‘science’ left on this cruise, so we’re trying to pack in as much work as possible before we have to start the weeklong steam back to the UK. We’ve been battling against weather and time for four weeks now, trying to collect as much data (and as many animals) as possible for everyone’s research. It is always difficult to get the right balance of work to satisfy everyone’s sampling requirements—things inevitably go wrong with the equipment sometimes, or the weather gets so rough that we can’t get any work done. There’s not much you can do in these situations except dance around in a circle, offer up some deep-sea mud to Poseidon, and cross your fingers that things will go according to plan.

As we near the end of the cruise, everyone is starting to plan their imminent return home. Our conversations have recently centred around our ‘firsts’ once we get back port. We miss our families/partners/children, our huge comfy beds with feather pillows and duvets, driving around in our cars, and walking our dogs (who sadly weren’t allowed to come onboard). We even miss the sight of trees. Or any discernible landscape features, for that matter. Personally, I really miss cooking. Don’t get me wrong—the onboard chefs are amazing, and I have been privy to some amazing pieces of cake over the past four weeks—but I would just like to chop some vegetables and stir them in a pot. I also miss the radio (the music library on my laptop has got quite the sore workout this past month, and it will be nice to have some more variety).

Alas, I digress with my dreams of dry land. We’ve had two straight days of trawling, with a few more planned in the next few days (hopefully). Yesterday was quite the interesting catch. There was a bit of a scare when the trawl got tangled up during the night—we were hoping the equipment would come up ok, and we waited with baited breath until 10am. Finally, it came up, but the catch was…MUD. We couldn’t even see the animals when we emptied the net—nevermind that, we couldn’t even fit the trawl catch into a bucket. The net was so bulging and full of mud that we ended up just emptying it onto the ship’s deck. We had to scoop it all into buckets (an arduous task that filled many, many buckets) and wash out all the mud before we could extract the fish and invertebrates. Needless to say, everyone was so dirty by the end of it that most of us had to be hosed down before we were allowed to go inside. There was mud everywhere—even on our faces and our hair—although a lot of that was put there deliberately. Many of us had our faces streaked with ‘war paint’. Of course, after all the fun we still had to separate all the different taxa and identify the species. We didn’t finish until well after dinnertime!