(Remember to click on the links within the above photograph for pictures.  All photographs other than those in ‘Shots by Norbert Wu’ are taken by Martin Schuster.)

Welcome to the expedition blog for the 2010 National Science Foundation sponsored antarctic photography expedition. A team led by the wildlife photographer Norbert Wu will travel to Palmer Station on the Antarctic peninsula to photograph the rarely seen marine life of this productive region. Throughout the expedition I’ll be posting reports on our field experiences above and below the water, as well as reporting on the nature of everyday life at an Antarctic research station. I’ll also write about the ecology of the antarctic peninsula’s near-shore habitats and the amazing organisms that inhabit these waters. When I return in March I will be giving a lecture/presentation on our experiences with many interesting photos. Come join me via the internet during this adventure!

Map of Permanent US Antarctic Stations (Palmer is at Top Left)

December 28: Santiago, Chile

Weather: Sunny! 15C

About twenty four hours ago I left the Anchorage airport on the first leg of my four flight trip from Anchorage to Punta Arenas, Chile. There I will meet the team and we will embark on our trip accross the Drake passage to Palmer Station on the Antarctic Peninsula. Luckily I was able to sleep most of the way so I dont have much to report. Flying from Houston to Lima, Peru I occasionaly woke up in my window seat to see small mexican villages float by below us like bright islands in the night. It could almost have been a dream, as i´m in the slightly dissoriented state msot people enter while crossing timezones and finding your way around airports.

December 29: Punta Arenas, Chile

Weather: Partly Cloudy, 10C

I arrived in Punta Arenas yesterday after 36 hours of travel time. A quick shower and a cup of coffee brought me right back to reality. Punta Arenas is the largest southernmost town in the world. There is a small battle of pride between the city of Ushuaia, Argentina and Punta Arenas for this honor. Ushuaia is further south, but smaller than Punta Arenas, so each town claims to be the southernmost. The town itself is nice, though a little run down in places. I will post some pictures of the amazing view out to the Straight of Magellan when I get a chance.  There are lots of tourists everywhere, many of them also heading down to Antarctica, and others going north to the famous Patagonian Andes. I even met a guide who is travelling down to climb Mt. Vinson, the largest mountain on the Antarctic continent, and one of the coveted seven summits. This will be his 25th summit as a guide. These are the kind of people that congregate in Punta Arenas; adventurers and scientists from around the world.

Today we board the R/V (Research Vessel) Lawrence M. Gould, named for the second in command on Admiral Richard E. Byrds first Antarctic expedition. During this expedition the first flights were flown over the South Pole, deep in the interior of the continent. The Gould is ice-strengthened, which means that it can enter areas with ice, but cannot break fast ice like a large ice breaker. This wont be a concern to us, as the route to Palmer Station is free of fast ice. The waters of the Drake Passage between South America and the Antarctic peninsula are some of the roughest in the world, so it should be an interesting ride at the very least!

December 30: R/V Lawrence M. Gould

Weather: Partly Cloudy, 10C

Today we had our mandatory safety meeting and the remaining scientific gear was loaded onto the Gould in preparation for our late-afternoon departure. After stowing and lashing down the gear the first mate on the ship gave the safety briefing. The briefing consisted of a short video on terrorist threat levels similar to those used at airports, a demonstration of how to put on a cold-water survival suit, and a tour of the life rafts on the top deck. After the meeting the lines were cast off and the crew shouted fair well to their friends on the other US Antarctic Program Vessel, the R/V Nathanial B. Palmer.

It was a busy day for the crew and scientists alike, with the crew loading all the scientific gear and the scientists stowing the gear in the various laboratories and holds on the ship. Before a ship leaves port, especially in rough waters such as those that we’ll soon encounter, everything must be lashed down to an immovable object. Anything that you don’t lash down has the potential to be a pendulum of destruction when the ship starts to pitch and roll.

To reach the Drake Passage we’ll actually travel north for the first few hours inside the Straights of Magellan. A Chilean captain who knows the Straights like the back of his hand pilots the ship. After he boards a supply vessel the captain of the Gould takes over and we head south. We stay relatively close to the coast until we reach the tip of South America, which will be the last land we see until we reach the Antarctic Peninsula.

January 2: R/V Lawrence M. Gould

Weather: Partly Cloudy, 10C

Happy New Year! We celebrated the end of 2009 with an impromptu kazoo concert on the top deck, with a pot and pan accompaniment. No fireworks. Fire is everyone’s nightmare on a ship.

The Drake Passage is known for some of the roughest seas and most unpredictable weather in the world, but for the last day and a half we may as well have been cruising through a bathtub! The water is almost flat calm with no swells over four feet, and we even had a lot of sun yesterday. Until this morning the air temperature was well above freezing and I’ve been spending a lot of time on deck soaking up the warmth and watching the seas. Today we’re starting to get some ice buildup on the deck, a sure sign that we’re making headway on our journey south. We’ve been seeing lots of birds strafing the waves looking for fish. The largest are black browed albatross, which spend much of their life cruising the southern ocean. The smallest we’ve seen are the Wisons Storm Petrel, which are sooty black with a white patch near their tail. A small sailboat has been in and out of sight over the horizon for a few hours and I cant help but wonder how they’ll fair if the weather picks up and turns nasty. We’re supposed to hit the first islands of the Peninsula at around eight o’clock tonight, and from there we should have spectacular views until we reach Palmer station.

January 3: R/V Lawrence M. Gould

Weather: Partly Cloudy, 10C

Land! Our first view of antarctica was  Smith Island and Mt. Foster, a 6000+ ft peak that came into view earlier today along with our first iceberg of the trip. It’s pretty cloudy but the view is still amazing; the mountain looks like one giant white glacier, with veins of blue crevasses running through it.

We’ve been seeing a lot of humpback whales as we approach the island. None of them have been breaching, but we have seen a giant white tail or two. Penguins have been skipping around the boat on their way back to the large rookery (breeding grounds) on the island. I’m not sure what kind we’re seeing yet, but they could be chinstrap penguins judging by the markings we can see as they jump out of the water. They’ve been traveling in groups of five or more and jump out of the water every few feet. Their form reminds me of how salmon look when they jump out of the water. We’ve seen more and more icebergs that have broken off from the shelves along the peninsula. Some of them look hundreds of feet tall and glow bright blue with reflected light. Word has it that this is supposed to be a great year for icebergs near Palmer station. Ice melt is increasing and weather conditions in the Palmer area are changing faster than anywhere else in the world. According to our small boating officer last years icebergs were few and far between. Hopefully we’ll see a lot this year.

January 6: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Sunny, Clear Skies, .8C

Visibility (Underwater): 25 ft

We arrived at Palmer Station on January 3rd and since then there’s been a whirlwind of activity around the station. The Gould not only unloads Scientists at the station, it is the designated resupply vessel for everything from science gear to fresh fruits and vegetables. Naturally it’s arrival is an anticipated event here. Unloading operations took the better part of two days and the science crew got a chance to walk in the ‘backyard’ on the glacier and relax.

The last six hours of our ride to the station was spent in the Gerlache Straight, the most mountainous coastal area I’ve ever seen. The narrow body of water is flanked by peaks so exposed I can only compare them to the ‘Mooses Tooth’ area in the  frontal Alaska  Range. This is the route taken by most cruise ships when they sail the Peninsula, mostly because of the calm waters, amazing views, and abundance of whales and penguins.

Our first task here on station has been to set up our dive locker- the base operations for most activities that we’ll undertake. Here we get suited up, rinse gear, store our gear, and make the necessary gear repairs that go along with dry suit diving. We even have a clothes dryer in the locker to dry our insulated dive underwear in the all to common case of a leak.

Yesterday we did our checkout dive in Hero Inlet, a small inlet right across from the station. This was my first dive in Antarctic waters, and as I expected it was pretty similar to cold water diving in Alaska. The water temperature may have been a few degrees colder (there’s ice bergs and glaciers everywhere) but other than that it was a standard dive for my buddy and I. Diving on the Antarctic Peninsula is different from other areas on the continent as the area is mostly free of a permanent ice pack,  which allows an abundance of Kelp to grow in the photic zone (zone of light penetration). Kelps are fast growing marine algae commonly referred to as ‘brown algae’. They grow extremely quickly and provide a massive amount of primary production which supports a wide variety of invertebrate marine life. One thing that struck me immediately is that we found many similar invertebrates to those I’ve seen in Alaska, but they are much larger here. This is probably due to the colder water temperatures which  slows down the metabolism of animals and extends their lifespan, allowing them to grow larger than their temperate water equivalents.

My dive buddy has dove under the ice at McMurdo station many times and is a great person to dive with. He remarked that under the ice, where the waters are as cold as they can get (-1.8C!), invertebrates grow even larger than here at Palmer.  Our job here on Station will be to locate the best dive sites within the two mile boating limit that is set up for safety reasons. It’s just about the best job in the world in my opinion. As soon as we begin to take photographs I will post them and you can see for yourself how vibrant this ecosystem is.

A little more catch-up: Today the team went out for most of the day on our top of the line Mark V Zodiac  to get some topside pictures of birds, leopard seals, and ice bergs. It’s extremely sunny outside and almost every area we went to offered some great photo opportunities. Were putting together a species guide as part of the NSF project and we took shots of Skuas, Gulls, Giant Petrels, Elephant Seals, and Leopard Seals. Skuas are a common carrion feeder here and are closely related to the North American jaegers. Giant petrels are the largest petrels in the world and nest on at least one Island in the Palmer vicinity. The leopard seal is a top predator here and has nothing to fear from anyone. We actually get out of the water immediately if there are leopard seals in the water because they prey on large marine mammals such as penguins. We were able to get some good HD video of them sunning themselves on small ice bergs. The warmth is causing smaller chunks of ice to expand with a distinctive popping sound. When we cut the outboard on the zodiac it sounds like a giant popcorn machine. The glaciers are also calving more often in this warmer weather. Tomorrow we resume diving and hopefully i’ll have some photo’s to post later that evening.

January 8: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Sunny, Clear Skies, 2C

Our amazing weather continues! I’ve posted some photos from our zodiac excursions to the islands nearby. We’ve spent most of the last two days photographing the islands near Palmer Station. Sunscreen is a requirement on these topside excursions because of the very thin ozone layer in this region, and the amazingly sunny weather that we’ve had. Most of our time has been spent on Torgesson island, a nearby low profile island that has a large population of Adelie penguins. These little penguins are extremely entertaining to watch. They have very human habits; some mating pairs squabble and squwark at each other like a long married couple while fanning their fluffy chick(s) to ward off the intense heat that comes along with this warm weather. Most of the penguins in the Palmer station area are Adelie penguins, which have had a population boom in the last decade. They form distinct circular colonies which can be seen in some of the photo’s ive posted in Antarctic Flora and Fauna section of the website. Most of the mating pairs have one to two chicks which look like fluffy little balls of grey feathers with legs and beaks. Within the next month or so they should start to venture out to the shoreline in order to learn how to swim.

Further away from shore Leopard seals sun themselves on icebergs while digesting their early morning Penguin meal. These seals are obviously the top predator in the region, they have no fear of humans whatsoever. Their body shape is almost reptilian as they yawn and stretch themselves in a lackadaisical fashion. They spend most of the day relaxing on ice floes and we have never seen them on land. One of our goals throughout the project is to film Leopard seals hunting penguins.

The Elephant seals on the other hand relax on low incline rocky beaches, and are not seen on ice floes. They usually group together in harems made of one male and a group of females. They are extremely noisy and we can hear them growling and roaring from our vantage point on Torgesson Island. Soon they will undergo their yearly migration to open water in order to regain the weight that they have lost during the breeding season. A male Southern Elephant seal can weigh in at four tons! They spend up to ninety days on the beach without eating in order to mate with as many females as possible. To see one of these animals underwater would surely be an incredible experience.

January 10: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Sunny, Partly Cloudy, 2C, Sprinkling of Snow

Weekends at Palmer Station are spent carrying out the tasks that would be normally done by the support staff at a large facility. Palmer is the smallest US base on the continent, with a max capacity of 45 people. McMurdo and South Pole stations on the other hand can house 1200+ and 200+ people respectively. At these stations scientists, or ‘grantees’ as they are called because they all have NSF grants,  focus entirely on their work and have no other responsibilities. Here we all pitch in to clean, wash dishes, and restock everything from toilet paper to coffee. The activity is called ‘house mouse’ and takes place every Saturday afternoon. Everybody gets to draw a task from a hat, which can work out really well for some people and not so well for others. I got stuck with cleaning the men’s bathroom… There is even a blank slip every week and that lucky person gets to relax or carry on their research. Living here has been compared to a communal society that actually works. One of the reasons that it works so well is because we are all here for a purpose. Whether you are an employee of Raytheon Polar Services or a scientist/grantee we all have a purpose here and know our jobs. The more efficiently we take care of our living area the sooner we can get back to the science. Or in our case the photography, filming, and compilation of a species guide we are working on for the Palmer area.

After House Mouse we have a station meeting during which any issues from the previous week are discussed and we go over the activities of the next week. Besides meals this is the only time that the entire station is in the same spot at the same time. Its interesting to hear about how peoples projects are coming along. We have a group of entomologists (insect scientists) who are studying freeze tolerance in the only endemic (unique to an area) land animal on the antarctic continent; a 5mm wingless midge. There is also a group studying bacterial photosynthesis, a group studying zooplankton (small animals that live in the water column), and a scientist from Florida who is measuring electronic impulses stimulated by vision in krill, one of the most abundant multi-celled organisms on earth and a necessary food for survival of penguins, whales, and the antarctic tern. After the station meeting we have a large dinner prepared by our fantastic chefs. I will have to start cooking again on my return to AK because I will definitely not be able to return to my diet of ramen, yams, and pizza.

Sunday is the one day of the week that nobody has to work, though most of the scientists choose to do so. Our group went out to Torgeson island in order to watch penguin chicks while I stayed in and organized some of the photo’s we have for our species guide.

Tomorrow we begin dive operations! More on that ASAP.

January 11: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Partly Cloudy, 2C, Sprinkling of Snow

Visibility: 15-25 ft

Everyone is feeling well, the congestion sickness contracted by some of us on the Gould has passed and we can now safely get in the water! We did two dives today, one morning dive at a site by Torgeson island and an afternoon dive at a more exposed location at Breaker island. We scouted out the Torgeson island site yesterday while fine tuning the settings on a submersible camera. The camera, which is attached to a 100 ft tether, can be lowered into the water column from a zodiac. It was quite dark, but the site looked promising. The wind picked up a little bit today and clouded up the water. While the diving was nice, the conditions were not optimal for photography. We collected some organisms for our new aquarium setup which I will post this evening. The first fifty feet or so of the subtidal shoreline is dominated by kelp in all directions, and to find neat organisms you must part the understory and peer at the rock beneath. Sometimes I feel like a kid again, rolling over rocks to find critters of all sorts.  Much of the rock beneath the kelp understory is covered in an encrusting coraline algae which grows extremely slowly. We find similar species in many temperate and arctic areas. In the Aleutian islands, where I carry out  my graduate research, the encrusting algae can grow up to seven inches thick! Some scientists have estimated that it can take hundreds of years to achieve this size. Beneath the understory we find a wide variety of organisms that I will catalog for our field guide, and hopefully post on this site as well. So far we’ve seen sponges, hydroids, brittle stars, sea stars, gastropods, limpets by the thousands, fish, tunicates, anenomes, and the occasional amphipod. For those of you who don’t know some of these organisms, I will be describing them in another section of the site as time permits.

Our second dive was at what we thought was a wall near Breaker island, a more exposed location near our two mile boating limit. It turned out that the wall was actually a gradual drop to about 110 ft. Here we got below the lower limit of most kelp species and were able to observe a mix of foliose red algae, tunicates, and hydroids. We even collected a small nudibranch (sea slug). Despite their unappealing name nudibranchs are some of the most delicate and beautiful organisms in the ocean. They generally do not do well in aquariums, so if the little guy starts to look unhappy I will release him back to his home. At the end of each dive we must do what is called a ‘safety stop’ at fifteen feet of depth. This ensures that the nitrogen we have accumulated in our tissues has ample time to leave our bodies before we surface. The exposed location of Breaker island gave us a little bit of a swell during this stop, and I had my first experience with underwater seasickness. I’ve heard that it’s a common problem, but didn’t really believe it until today. As the swell lifts you up and drops you while you are underwater it is easy to become nautious. Everything in your field of vision is moving; you, your dive buddy, the algae all around you. The ground is not. This creates an extremely unpleasant effect that ended in me feeding the fish after I climbed into our waiting zodiac. Its really a shame, lunch was delicious.

All in all it was a busy day as Norbert Wu and the remaining member of the team also spent time on Torgeson island capturing the fast growing penguin chicks in the rookeries. Soon they will begin to enter the water and learning to swim. This will be an exciting time for us, as we really want to see them getting eaten by Leopard seals.

January 12: Palmer Station, AntarcticaWeather: Sunny, 3C

Visibility: 6-12 ft

While the sun has been a boon for photographing and filming on the surface, it has decreased the photo potential of our dive sites dramatically. When we first arrived at Palmer the water was relatively clear, but as our good weather continues the small photosynthetic organisms known as phytoplankton have begun to bloom. A phytoplankton bloom occurs when something that is usually limiting their growth (such as sunlight or nutrients) is added to their habitat. In this case the long hours of sunshine have allowed the phytoplankton to reproduce and cloud up the water column. This morning the calm weather allowed us to motor out to a dive site that is often inaccessible due to breaking waves. The site is near the edge of our boating limit and is called killer whale rocks. We did not see any killer whales. We were excited about the dive, as it is a steep pinnacle that barely pokes over sea level on a calm day. Our hopes of good visibility were dashed as soon as we submerged. In order to reach the walls of the pinnacle we had to swim diagonally down into the water column while following a compass bearing. Visibility was about six feet on our swim to the wall, so it was necessary to stay close together. At a depth of about eighty feet the wall became visible and we were treated with fantastic, but very limited, views of giant encrusting sponges and large kelp plants. As we descended deeper along the wall the kelp began to thin out and we were able to collect a small orange fish, known as the most colorful fish in antarctic waters. The fish is called Lepidonotothen nudifrons, or more commonly the ‘gaudy notothen’. A picture of him is available under the ‘Aquarium’ section of the pictures area. We were also able to collect a sea spider, which is actually not a spider at all but an arthropod related to the ancient horseshoe crabs. They are very primeval looking organisms and are difficult to find in AK, but here they grow quite large and are easier to spot. Plus my dive buddy has the eyes of an eagle.  Luckily the surge didn’t bother me so much on this dive and I was able to enjoy my breakfast throughout the day.

In the afternoon and evening we went whale hunting and were able to observe a group of three juvenile humpbacks swimming and feeding on Krill. Watching the whales with clear views of the surrounding mountains and glaciers was great.  We keep a safe distance so that we don’t disturb their natural behavior, but sometimes it seems as if they’re pretty curious. We had one stick its head up within ten feet of our zodiac a couple of times and check us out.  It’s possible that the increased phytoplankton abundance has attracted more krill to the area, and in turn the humpbacks. Other scientists on station expect humpbacks to become more common in the coming weeks. I took about two hundred photo’s in the hope of catching a fluke as the whales dive down to feed, but only one or two turned out well. These will be under the wildlife section of the pictures area. Our diving in the coming weeks will probably be focused on collecting and identifying organisms for our field guide until the visibility clears up.

We had a french sail boat anchor up near the station this evening. It could be the same one we passed on the Drake Passage. That seems months ago, yet its only been 10 days.

January 13: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, .2C, Wind 14 Knots

Visibility: 2-6 ft

We were told that the weather would turn on us eventually. It was easy to shrug off, but this morning as we looked for whales and elephant seals the waves did indeed pick up and it began to snow. We spent about four hours taking iceberg photos and spotting for humpbacks. The only ones we saw were beyond our boating limit but seemed to be diving really deep judging by the vertical position of their flukes as they descended into the water. They would have made great subjects had they been closer. As we began to get chilled the snow changed to rain, and with lunchtime approaching and the humpbacks playing further and further on the horizon we headed back to station. Good thing too, lunch was a delicious mix of middle eastern food. Our busy cooks prepared fallafel and lamb pitas with an amazing yogurt sauce. I could get used to this life…

Our dive in the afternoon took me back to a project I worked on in the Beaufort sea north of Barrow. Up there the visibility was so bad because of sediment and phytoplankton detritus that I couldn’t even see my hand in front of my face. While our jaunt in Hero inlet did not quite compare to the horrible visibility up north, we definitely did not find the ice fish that we would like to capture and photograph. While most fish inhabiting antarctic waters are cold tolerant, the ice fish is unique in the sense that it has no hemoglobin (an oxygen carrying protein) in its blood which gives it a transparent appearance. Scientists believe that the ice fish absorbs oxygen through its skin. Life without an oxygen bearing protein is only possible in a frigid environment such as that found in the Southern Ocean. Gases such as oxygen can dissolve into cold liquids at much higher concentrations than warm liquids. This is one of many reasons that cold water habitats can be more productive than their warm water counterparts.

I had to use a borrowed suit during this dive because I discovered a pinkie sized hole in my boot while I was suiting up. Luckily I found out before the dive and not when I jumped in the water! Patching a hole in a dry suit is pretty easy, it just takes a while. Right now the Aquaseal I used to fix it up is drying. I’ll find out whether my repair holds tomorrow, one way or another…

I’ve posted two pictures of dry suit repair in the diving section.

Tonight is a big night on station, the National  Geographic Explorer is returning to the Peninsula after it’s cruise back to Ushwaia in order to pick up more tourists. Among these high paying passengers is the space traveler Buzz Aldrin. Hes going to give a lecture on the ship at 9:00. About what I don’t know, but to hear an astronaut tell stories is an opportunity I cant miss. (I’m a bit of a Space geek, but I think diving is the closest I’ll get to zero gravity). Being entertained by high rolling tourists is also not bad. To them we are almost celebrities, the indigenous people of the Antarctic Continent. Walking on one of these ships is reminiscent of an Alaskan traveling to Florida. “Do you have hot showers?…. Yes, yes we do.” “Aren’t you cold at night?… no, we have blankets.”

January 14: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, 2C, Wind 30 Knots

The wind is howling outside and all boat operations have been shut down until further notice. We have a 20 knot wind limit for deploying the zodiacs, and just by staring at the whitecaps moving out to open water you can tell that the conditions are bad. This is the Antarctica I was expecting, not the sunny paradise we’ve been inhabiting for most of our stay here. Luckily there is lots of lab work to do inside the buildings; everything from working on identifications for our species guide to mopping the floor of our dive locker to repairing aquariums and drysuits. I’m coming down with the cold that I’ve somehow managed to avoid thus far, so it’s a good day for some indoor work. I was able to experiment with an aquarium setup I’ve rigged up for Norbert Wu to take pictures that will be in our NSF species guide. I’ve posted these in the aquarium section.

Yesterday evening the station crew and scientists were invited to the National Geographic Explorer for Buzz Aldrin’s talk. As a space fan the talk was a bit narrow and disappointing, but being able to meet a man who actually stepped foot on the Moon is an experience in itself. The Explorer is also not a bad place to spend a few hours mingling with tourists who are really interested in what we do. The National Science Foundation gives lectures aboard certain cruise ships as well as tours of Palmer Station in exchange for ferrying some scientists and Raytheon personnel back and forth between Punta Arenas and the Peninsula.

Hopefully the weather clears tomorrow, and we’ll get to start up our zodiacs again…

January 15: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, 2C, Wind 22 Knots

Bad weather and a headcold kept me inside today. Spent some time rigging up a new photo tank and experimenting with my camera. Tomorrow the weather may clear and we’ll go out to film and take photo’s.

Hope everybody back home or wherever you may be enjoys the weekend.

January 17: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, Raining, 3C, Wind 30 Knots

Visibility: 6 ft

This has been a slow weekend at station, most people have spent their time inside hiding from intermittent snow/sleet/rain/quasi-freezing snow rain and constant winds that have kept our zodiac fleet grounded. Yesterday Ryan and I were lucky enough to get in the water, the only two grantees on station that were allowed to beat the weather to get some outside work done, besides the commercial dive crew who are repairing the pier. They go out in any conditions since they do not require a zodiac and can (and do!) work in near zero visibility, freezing rain, or blustery winds.

Our dive was uneventful as we could barely see five feet in front of our own masks, but we did manage to scout out a good section of our local inlet in search of the elusive ice fish. It’s clear body structure will make it especially difficult to find in low viz conditions. Our dive took us along a shallow section of Hero inlet where we observed many sea anemones, cucumbers, sponges, and bryozoans. This is a high flow area that has quite a bit of tidal fluctuation (by Antarctic standards, not AK where we can have 30+ ft of change!) and thus supports a wide variety of filter and suspension feeding organisms.

High flow areas naturally support higher populations of these organisms because their feeding apparatus can contact more water in less time.

These filter feeders comprise a functional feeding group (as opposed to a systematic group, which is related through ancestry) that is able to extract phytoplankton and detritus from the water column.

Filter feeders that we commonly see in the inlet are sponges, bryozoans, and whales (the largest creatures in the ocean feeding on some of the smallest). Sponges and bryozoans are sedentatry organisms at opposite ends of the multi-cellular ‘tree of life’. Sponges are very ancient creatures that have been around since pre-cambrian times (at least 500 million years!), while bryozoans are some of our closest multicellular relatives. In fact, our developement and that of the bryozoan are quite similar in the early stages, even though we look nothing alike as adults. Ironically both sponges and bryozoans can look quite similar to each other. These organisms actively filter water through their bodies and extract tiny particles of phytoplankton and other organic matter. This tiny food adds up; some sponges, like those we saw at Killer Whale Rocks, can be five feet accross!

Suspension feeders such as sea cucumbers can  extract larger detritus from the water. If you look at the sea cucumber pictures in the aquarium section you can see that they have feeding tentacles which are highly branched. When  enough particles come into contact with these filamentous white tentacles the cucumber can bend the tentacle into it’s oral cavity and ‘suck’ the food into its gut. During a dive the only part of a sea cucumber that we see is this feeding apparatus. The rest of their elongated body is hidden in cracks and crevices or buried in sand in order to hide from predators. In response to even the slightest vibration their tentacles are gone. It’s amazing how fast they can button themselves up and become almost invisible.  Some of my favorite dive experiences have been spent gliding over boulders and crevices covered with suspension feeders such as sea cucumbers and polychaetes (a type of marine worm that occurs in virtually every environment). As you approach a boulder covered in these animals they begin to quickly withdraw into their bodies in what looks like a retreating wave of moving color. One my fascinations with diving is how weird and different all the animals are from what we are used to. Colorful fish are just the tip of the iceberg.

Other than our dive in Hero inlet we’ve all been making the best of the bad weather by catching up on work that can’t be done during the week. For me it means hashing out some problems in the ‘methods’ section of my thesis draft. For others downtime can mean watching movies, playing cards, reading, or catching up on whatever odds and ends have managed to follow us down here. We even did a ‘polar plunge’ yesterday with a science group that will be leaving soon. The hottub definately makes jumping into the cold water a pain-free experience. For some, others dont really agree with me on this point…

I’ve taken some pictures around what we call the ‘bio’ building, which contains dorms, the galley, and most of our lab space. I’ll post these under the Palmer Station pictures section.

January 18: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, Snow, 1.2C, Wind 4 Knots

Visibility: 15 ft

While dense fog is usually an interesting and eerie type of weather, it is definitely not a great thing to wake up to on a dive day. At seven AM this morning we were socked in. The wind was down though, so we were determined to explore a dive site called Bonaparte Pt. Bonaparte is relatively close to station and as the name suggests it is a point at the end of a small peninsula which can be seen from station. It would be easily accessible by land if one were to walk over our ‘backyard’ glacier trail, but it is a highly restricted area reserved for nesting birds. Luckily we’re jumping in the water about 10 meters from shore, and don’t need to worry about the birds or their hatchlings. Calm waters made for great dive conditions, even if it was foggy. This was a short and deep dive, as there is a really interesting wall that begins at about 80-100 ft and drops down to 130 ft. We left the kelp beds behind at ~90 ft and were into an entirely different habitat dominated by huge sea cucumbers, bryozoans, and sponges. While kelp and the organisms associated with it are really interesting for me (I study it after all…), most people who dive are happy to leave it behind because it can be a little monotonous unless you root around underneath the canopy. In areas that are kelp free, organisms become easier to spot and visibility is often better (mostly because you are deeper, not because of the kelp itself). Once we reached our deepest point we could actually see a little bit into the distance, which was a relief after our last few mucky dives. On this dive we were able to collect another Gaudy Notothen (the bright orange fish in the aquarium gallery) to replace our old one, who sadly bit the dust a few days ago due to a little mishap. Our new Notothen is adjusting well to his home and seems to be doing fine.

Norbert and another member of our team were able to spend some time observing and photographing the growing Adelie penguin chicks on Torgeson Island in the afternoon, while I helped a scientist studying Krill trawl for his specimens. The penguin chicks should be learning how to swim soon and we expect Leopard seal activity to increase during this time as the chicks make easy prey. My afternoon trawling was a relaxing experience. It was still a bit foggy and snowing lightly while we puttered through a thick cover of ‘brash ice’. Brash ice is made of thousands of tiny bergs ranging in size from ice cubes to a meter or so across. It forces you to go very slowly and dodge the larger bergs, as they can get lodged between your outboard and the back of the zodiac, causing all sorts of navigational issues. The only sounds other than the light put put of the outboard was the occasional glacier calving and the far-away roar of Elephant seals fighting to defend their harem. John was able to catch a krill or two for his physiological experiments, and I nabbed an interesting little organisms called a Pteropod. Pteropod’s are a form of shelled sea snail that live their entire lives in the water column. The foot has evolved into two thinly membranous ‘wings’ that are used to propel the Pteropod through the water column. They’re hard to find because the shell is usually transparent, and they are very small. Our specimen is only about five millimeters long. They are often referred to as sea butterflies because of the graceful movements that their foot produces. They are also extremely difficult to photograph… I managed to get a few shots that are discernible and have included them in the aquarium gallery.

Tonight I got to visit with a couple and their four children who have been sailing from France to the Antarctic peninsula. They arrived at Palmer Station yesterday and have been traveling for 18 months! They have a ton of interesting stories and have somehow managed to make it through the whole trip without going raving mad in the close quarters of their sailboat. According to them sailing is a way of life that they wouldn’t trade for anything. I can see the appeal, living a carefree but adventurous existence and exploring the world is not a bad way to go. It’s pretty amazing how many people I’ve met on this trip from all over the world, from Alaskan mountain guides to sailing families to foreign scientists; and I’m sure that there’s more to come…

Six People, 18 months…

The Parents

The Route

January 20: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, Snow, 2C, Wind 10-15 Knots

Visibility: 20 ft
Today we may have found one of the few areas within our limits that has decent water clarity (20 ft or so), nevermind the fact that it’s pitch black because we have to dive through 120 ft of phytoplankton to reach the site. Hermit Island is about a mile and a half east of Station, and we were trying to find a good wall to dive on in order to collect new organisms. We were expecting a wall here because our mini-depth finder gave us readings of 120-150 ft only ten meters from shore. Sadly it is just a really steep slope, not really the exposed wall that we were hoping for. We’ll return in the afternoon and scout some more to see if what we can find (maybe some ice-fish!).

On our descent through the murky water Ryan spotted a tiny juvenile ice-fish swimming around in the water column. He (or she) was swimming around in little circles, probably a fish that had jest left it’s larval stage and was making it’s way towards the bottom… until two giant divers came along and scooped it up out of the water column. After catching the little fish we kept descending and hit the first rocks at about 90 ft. At about 120 ft visibility really opened up and with the help of Ryan’s monster dive light we were able to see pretty far into the distance. We are going to dive this site again this afternoon in the hopes of finding a larger ice-fish on the flat sandy bottom that extends out from the base of this steep slope.

I’m creating a picture section that will feature some of Norbert Wu’s shots from last year at Palmer, when visibility was significantly better. I’ll keep adding to this section throughout our stay here at Palmer. Our dives are really similar to the shots that you will see in this section, except for the fact that the water column is clouded up instead of clear. I’ll also post some shots of two giant Isopods that we collected yesterday at Bonaparte Pt., as well as our little ice-fish from today, in the Aquarium shots section.

January 21: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, 2.5C, Wind 3 Knots

Visibility: 4-20 ft
We continued our ice-fish search in our local Inlet that wraps from the pier to our ‘backyard’ glacier. We’ve had it on good authority that this is the spot to find these translucent hemoglobin-less fish. Capturing fish underwater can be a tricky business, but the ice-fish has such a slow metabolism that it shouldn’t be difficult. Here I’m going to quickly outline our strategy for bagging (literally) your average benthic (bottom dwelling) fish. The other fish that we’ve collected are a little harder to catch, but only if you startle them. Some benthic fish tend to be very still when they are not foraging in order to blend into the substrate. This is a good strategy most of the time, until you add a highly intelligent diver (compared to their normal predators, we’re pretty smart…) who can see through the disguise. My dive buddies insanely powerful LED dive light gives us even more of an edge. The next step after spotting the fish is to either 1) take the brunt approach and try to quickly slip your bag over it’s body, or 2) take the more coordinated subtle approach. The subtle approach involves one diver very slowly placing the open mesh bag in front of the fish, and the other diver ‘tickling’ the fish from behind. The startled fish darts forward in a vain attempt to swim away,  but soon finds out that it can’t- it’s  in the bag. Now you gently bring the fish to the surface, place it in a bucket filled with water and sea ice, and quickly transport it back to our aquarium for it’s first ever photo-shoot. We then release the fish back to their natural habitat where they resume their everyday lives. Most of our fish are captured using method 1.

Back to the ice-fish, once again we had no luck today. We spent thirty five minutes swimming against the incoming tide and covered a lot of ground. We saw kelp, anemones, snails, sea cucumbers, kelp, shrimp, clams, and kelp but no ice-fish. We saw lot’s of kelp. Most of the near-shore habitat here in the Palmer vicinity is COVERED in kelp. High flow and exposed locations are the optimal habitat for the large kelp plants that we find here. Kelp adds a lot of primary productivity to this ecosystem and is at the base of the Antarctic peninsula food chain, along with trillions of microscopic phytoplankton cells that have clouded up our water.

A lot of the neatest organisms that we are looking for, such as gorgonian corals, giant sea spiders, and hydroids are not typically associated with kelp. In order to find these weird animals we must either find wall’s where kelp has difficulty attaching, or go deep where kelp becomes less predominant because of lower light penetration (like all algae, kelp is photosynthetic). Often it is a combination of both and we end up diving a deep wall (never deeper than 130 ft, our depth limit). This was the case during our second dive today at Eichorst Island (see map). Eichorst is an ideal dive site. It drops quickly from the shoreline to over 100 ft, has a large and scenic wall between 100 ft and 130 ft, and there is a large ‘bench’ at 15 ft which is the depth at which we have to do our safety stop. For those who don’t dive, a safety stop is a precautionary measure to prevent decompression illness (the bends). By stopping at 15 ft for at least three minutes your body has time to expel some of the excess Nitrogen that has accumulated in tissues and joints during the dive. Because Nitrogen gas is not used by the body it tends to build up, and as you ascend from your deepest point it expands. Nitrogen buildup is not dangerous in and of itself, it is the expansion of Nitrogen bubbles in your body that can cause decompression illness. The safety stop is merely a way to ‘offgas’ the accumulated Nitrogen before completing your ascent.

During this dive we found the largest sea spider that I’ve ever seen, much larger than any tarantula I’ve seen in pet stores. The spider was climbing up a gorgonian, commonly known as a sea whip (a stalked colonial organism related to hydroids and jellyfish). I was able to scoop it into our largest collecting jar to prevent it from being squished during our dive. They  are very fragile animals, and unlike a terrestrial spider they have almost no abdomen. As a guy who really hates spiders, I was happy to have my gloves on during this transfer.  I’ve posted a shot of the sea spider and some of our other newest additions in the ‘aquarium’ section.

It’s been great getting a couple of steady dive days in and tomorrow we will also scout out some new sites, weather permitting of course.

January 24: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, 3C, Wind 12 Knots

Visibility: 4-40 ft! (Varies w/ location and depth)

Correction: I’ve learned that throughout my ramblings on this website I’ve been spreading the rumor that we are diving in kelp forests down here in Antarctica. Well, the truth is that there are NO kelp forests on the Antarctic continent. What I have been calling kelp is actually a large brown Algae in the order Desmarestiales. To explain this mistake I’m going to talk a little bit about Macro-Algae.

Macro-Algae is the general definition for multi-cellular algae, what we know as the ‘sea weeds’. They can be found in virually every nearshore ecosystem on the planet and even extend deep into the ocean in exceptioinally clear waters. The macro=algae are all photosynthetic and therefore have a minimal requirement for light input. This requirement varies between the three major groups of macro-algae depending on the concentration and nature of their photosynthetic pigments. During photosynthesis electrons are excited by light energy, and this energy is transferred through a series of complex reactions which eventually utilize the energy to build organic molecules. Each type of pigment utilized by these algae absorbs a different wavelength of light. In many cases an algal community is made up of many species, each utilizing different pigments and thus different wavelengths, maximizing each individuals success.

The three major groups of macro-algae are Greens (Chlorophyta), Reds (Rhodophyta), and Browns (Phaeophyceae). All three groups are found here in the Palmer Station vicinity. Brown algae represent the largest growth forms of the three groups, both here on the Antarctic Peninsula and elsewhere. Though algal taxonomic groups are constantly undergoing regrouping (the genus I am studying has changed names twice since I started grad school!) there are about 18 distinct groups within the Brown algae. Two of these groups are the Laminariales (Kelp!) and the Desmerestiales (Not Kelp!). The two or three species of large brown algae that I have been calling kelp througout this website are actually members of the order Desmerestiales, and thus not Kelp’s. Their large size (some more than 6 m long) led me to this conclusion. From now on I’ll call them ‘large brown algae’.

In the last two days we’ve continued our explorations of the many dive sites around the area. Some are quite spectacular, and some are a dissapointment due to either bad visibility or a general lack of new critters. One cool new animal that we’ve been seeing as we move further away from shore are Salps. Salps are one of those animals that make you realize how early science fiction directors came up with their ideas for spaceships. Their basic morphology is a filter feeding organism (the individuals we see the most are bright orange), surrounded by a clear membrane used to isolate and propel water through their feeding apparatus. The salps are often found living colonially and form long chains of individuals. One of the weirdest experiences I’ve had here in Antarctica is descending through the water column, not seeing the bottom or the surface, and finding a long chain of translucent salps floating in the beam of my light. They look like a chain of perfect orange spheres surrounded by a nebulous cloud of tissue that reflects and refracts light in the weirdest of ways. I was able to capture one of the smaller colonies that we’ve come accross and phtogograph an individual organism in our aquarium. This shot will be included in the Aquarium section along with some pictures that Norb shot of a large Krill we collected.

Salps and krill are arguably two of the most important animals found in the Antarctic. Not much is known about Salps, but recent research has suggested that their extremely high rate of asexual reproduction allows them to take advantage of phytoplankton blooms more effectively than many other organisms. Salps have what is called an ‘alteration of generations’ life cycle, meaning that they undergo both asexual (cloning, or budding) and sexual (genetic exchange) reproduction. The asexual stage allows them to rapidly expand their population in optimal conditions and the sexual stage maintains their genetic diversity. After a phytoplankton bloom the large salp biomass provides a food source for many benthic organisms, forming a significant link between the water column and the benthos.

Krill (Euphausia superba) are the most abundant multi-cellular grazers of phytoplankton in the Southern Ocean. Krill are found in all of the word’s oceans, but their abundance in the Antarctic is staggering. Some researchers estimate that in the Southern Ocean the biomass of krill is twice that of the entire human race! Most of the marine animals we hear about in the Antarctic (Whales, Seals, and Penguins) survive almost exclusively off of krill or krill eating organisms.

On our dive yesterday at Janus Island we were able to observe Krill for the first time. They are almost translucent, with a little bit of a pink reflection and a green mass in the middle. The green mass is actually their stomach, filled with microscopic phytoplankton (Micro-algae). Krill are surprisingly mobile, and have large eyes in order to avoid predation. They undergo a diurnal (meaning daily) migration from surface waters to deeper waters. During the day krill can be found in deep water, conserving energy and avoiding predation (predators can’t see as well in the darker, deeper waters). At night krill swarm to the surface and feed on phytoplankton. One of the krill we have captured was quite photogenic, and we even got some HD footage of the little guy with the huge HD camera.

Our krill dive was cut short by the only animal that we try to avoid- the leopard seal. To watch one of these predators eyeball you under water is a pretty terrifying experience. Whereas most seals and sea lions are intensely curious and will swim right up to you or strafe you to find out what you are doing, a leopard seal has different manerisms. When I first saw the seal (about 90 ft deep), it was holding its place in the water column and staring at us with it’s head twisted in their uniquely reptilian fashion. It’s easy to anthropomorphize these animals, but it’s pretty obvious that the curiosity exhibited by other seals is replaced by a predatory instinct unique to the leopard seal. Our leopard seal protocol is to immediately abort the dive, so we didn’t hang around. Luckily it did not follow us up into the water column and we were able to complete our ascent and safety stop without any further encounters. Im going to add some of Norb’s Leopard seal photo’s to the ‘Shots by Norbert Wu‘ section shortly. They are pretty impressive animals.

All in all it’s been a good week for Ryan and I (lot’s of diving), but visibility is still too unpredictable and bad for great videography/ photography.

January 26: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, 1C, Wind 19 Knots

Visibility: 4-60 ft! (Varies w/ location and depth)

We had one of our busiest days yesterday, and we’ll be working longer hours in the weeks to come as wildlife activity reaches it’s summer peak. According to other scientists and Raytheon employees who have spent many summers here, this has been a slow one in terms of humpback whale activity, usually one of the more common marine mammals seen around the station. Until yesterday we’ve only been able to photograph whales once or twice, usually from distances that even a large telephoto lens has trouble with. This changed yetserday afternoon, which happened to be just the time that the sun broke through persistant cloud cover we’ve had for the last few days. We were able to observe and photograph three humpbacks feeding for about 90 minutes near the east end of our boating area. While I’ve seen humpback whales before in Resurrection Bay and Prince William Sound, I havnt watched them employ their strategy known as ‘bubble net feeding’ until yesterday. While humpback’s are found in most of the world’s oceans, bubble net feeding is a behavioral adaptation used mostly in Alaskan, Southern South American, and Antarctic waters. The method usually involves a group of at least three whales, and can be pretty spectacular to watch. It’s one of the few opportunities to stare into the open mouth of a whale.

Bubble net feeding takes advantage of the schooling nature of small fish and krill. These organisms find safety in numbers by grouping together in tight balls. One whale in a feeding group will swim below a school of krill (in Antarctica, small fish in other areas) in a circular pattern and blow sheets of bubbles from its mouth. As the bubbles ascend into the water column they expand and fractionate, forming a dense cyclindrical curtain around the group of krill that they cannot penetrate. The krill group together and are forced to the surface as the bubble blowing whale quickly tightens the net and ascends through the water column. While the krill are forced to the surface the other whales swim in tight circular patters just beneath the surface to further confuse and ‘herd’ the krill. When they do this the only part of the whale that can be seen is one fin or tail fluke extending out of  the water, moving extremely fast and in a tightening circle. Now the krill are trapped in the upper few meters of the water column and all of the whales in the group open their mouths, lunging straight up out of the water and trapping thousands of pounds of krill and sea water in their mouths. They then snap their jaws shut and strain out the sea water through their baleen plates, isolating the krill and swallowing them. It’s an amazing sight to see a group of whales all burst from the surface, mouths agape. Humpbacks can unhinge their jaws during the final moments of this display, filling up an expandable area inside their mouths known as the bucal cavity. We spent about an hour watching this activity and were able to shoot literally hundreds of photographs. As we sort through them I will post some in the flora and fauna section of the page, though this may take a day or two.

Bubble feeding was definately the highlight of the last two days, but we were also able to explore a few new dive sites, one of which had exceptionally clear water for this time of year. This site was an alternate location we visited because of high winds, a naturally protected cove which receivs a lot of offshore water during the incoming tide. While there was not much to see (flat rocky bottom with surprisingly little life) it was a refreshing change to be able to swim off of the bottom instead of directly on top of it, and see around you in all directions for at least 50 ft. It also allowed us to see the approaching leopard seal, prematurely ending our dive. We were able to capture a new and large nudibranch before the seal showed up, along with a stalked sponge that looks exactly like a little orange balloon, both of which i’ll photograph shortly.

January 27: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, 2.6C, Wind 4.3 Knots

Visibility: 20-80+ ft! (Varies w/ location and depth)

Once again our visibility in the water has improved dramatically. I believe the reason for this is that offshore winds have brought in cold, fresh water; and the fact that we are starting to dive on some of the islands at the limits of our boating area (towards open water) doesnt hurt either. We dove Laggard and  Cormorant Islands today, both near the Eastern limits of the boating zone. Laggard was a great dive where we explored a shallow (140 ft) canyon connecting the main island to a small rock outcropping. Our visibility was around 50 ft, allowing us to dive on the slope of the canyon and still see to the bottom. The abundance of red algae on the slopes, and the river-like appearance of the current-scoured rocks at the base of the canyon made it feel like we were swimming through a  recently flooded valley. It was a little windy today, which can create a surge effect in the shallow waters where we wait out our three minute safety stop. Floating in the water while you are being tossed back and forth with the surge can be disorienting, but is really entertaining when you get used to it.

Our second dive at Cormorant Island (aptly named for a nesting site of the ‘Blue Eyed Shag’, a species of Southern Ocean Cormorant) was by far our best dive of the trip. We were able to dive on a fifty foot wall that extended at least 200 feet in either direction of the area we descended on. The wall began at 80 ft and descended from 130-140 ft in some areas. Our visibility was at least 80 ft, giving us our first glimpse into the deeper waters that we cann0t explore. At the deepest point of our dive (115 ft) we were able to stare down the slope into about 200 ft of water. We were able to see giant white sponges that must have been five feet tall, and just as wide. It was quite a sight. The wall was covered in hydroids, sponges, and ascidians and I was able to make some collections which I began to photograph today. I photographed some coralline algae, a sun star, a solitary tunicate, a bryozoan, a mottled sea star, a compound tunicate, and a marine leech. This was without a doubt the most scenic and clearest dive that I have done in my life, and weather permitting we will visit the site again tomorrow.

In the afternoon we began testing the ‘krill-cam’ that we have been brainstorming about for a while now. We’ve rigged up a harness for the High Definition underwater camera, and have secured a zodiac with a nice fish finder and a winch cable. Our plan is to use the fish finder to locate schools of krill, a technique that has been tested by our resident krill scientist, and then lower the camera into the water column in order to film these super-abundant creatures. We have much testing to do, but our preliminary tests went well. The real trick is to stay on top of the schools of krill once we’ve located them. More on this later.

January 29: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, Snow, Fog. 0.6C, Wind 10 Knots

Visibility: 30 ft

Time is does not flow at a constant rate while you are doing field work (scientists refer to any work not taking place in the lab or in the office as ‘field work’). Like the other trips that I’ve been on (admittedly only a few, but enough to really think about this time thing…) the first few weeks go by at a steady pace, and then a little past the halfway point, time starts to FLY. I think this is due to the fact that in the beginning everything is new and you haven’t really established a set routine. Once your everyday work activities become routine, the days begin to fly by. In my case the daily routine goes something like this:

Breakfast at seven thirty, get geared up and go diving until around eleven thirty, eat a fantastic lunch, get geared up and go diving until mid afternoon, return to Palmer and grab the HD camera and whatever other camera gear we will be using for topside work, find some whales, penguins, leopard seals, or other birds to film/photograph, eat dinner at five thirty or so, and then either do some research on taxonomic ID’s or take photo’s in the aquarium until it’s time for some sleep.

It’s really hard to believe that we have only 16 days left on the Peninsula. I’ve already decided that I want to come back, preferably in the Antarctic winter and preferably to dive, but I’d settle for just about any other job too.

Yesterday and today we continued our exploratory dives and were able to visit three new sites and an old one. The most notable dive was yesterday morning when we dove a ship wreck near the Station. The Bahia paraiso is an Argentine vessel that sunk on a routine visit to the station in 1989. The 300+ foot long ship leaked an estimated 600,000 liters of diesel fuel into the surrounding waters, impacting the ecosystem in ways that are still being studied today. It was my first dive on a wreck, and quite interesting despite our five foot visibility. The stern of the ship pokes above the water column, providing an easy descent onto the main structure. The hull was overgrown with filter feeders, mostly large tunicates such as the one I have photographed under the ‘Aquarium shots’ page, but much larger. These filter feeders thrive on the wreck for two reasons. The wreck is located between two islands and receives a lot of water flow, which is a primary requirement for a healthy population of filter feeders. The steep sides of the hull also provide an algae free environment which the tunicates can attach too. This was a pretty spooky dive, it was very dark and there is junk littering the sea floor to the point where it made me think we were diving in a scrap metal facility or some such place. All in all I hope to have some better wreck dives in the future, but this was a good start.

Our primary purpose at the other sites was to find our elusive ice fish. Once again we were unsuccessful, but we’ll keep on diving and exploring until we find one. Today it got very foggy and started to snow a lot. It made for some fun boating conditions, and was more like the weather that I expected to find down here.

Tomorrow we have the opportunity to take a Zodiac out to Dream Island, which is eight miles down the Peninsula from Palmer Station. It supports a large Penguin rookery and should have a lot of neat marine life to photograph. We won’t be allowed to dive there, which is sad because I’m sure the visibility would be excellent due to Dream Island’s offshore location. It will be an all day trip and our first opportunity to travel outside the conventional boating limits.

January 31: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, Sunny Afternoons 2C, Wind 0 Knots

Yesterday the team finally got permission to take a Zodiac out to Dream Island, where there is a large Penguin rookery,  and consequently more Leopard seal activity. I stayed behind, due to the large amount of camera gear piled into the boat, and an extra passenger who accompanies all science activities outside of the boating limits. The drive out did not seem very promising as far as the weather was concerned. There were miles of brash ice blocking the Zodiacs path, forcing our boating coordinator (who was along as an ‘out of boating limits’ supervisor) to drive very slowly and navigate carefully through these small ice bergs. The weather was very foggy, snowy, and a little windy. Despite these conditions the team was able to find a Leopard seal prowling through the brash ice in search of foraging penguins. The teams hours of circling the island searching for activity finally paid off. The hungry Leopard seal found an Adelie penguin relatively close to the Zodiac and immediately attacked it from below. When a Leopard seal catches a penguin it is reminiscent of a cat toying with a mouse. The first few minutes seem to be purely for the seals amusement, as it throws the penguin repeatedly into the air, dives below it and attacks it again as the penguin hits the water. This process is repeated a few times, and every time the penguin is hurled into the air there is a little less of it’s body left. Norb was able to film the whole event in HD while Ryan and Andy took lots of photo’s. Once I organize the whale bubble feeding photo’s and get permission to use some of the Leopard seal shots I will post them on this site. They are pretty spectacular.

Today the weather is sunny, the wind has laid down, and the brash ice is relatively sparse making for great boating conditions. This afternoon we’ll do some topside surveying for seals and birds.

February 1: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, 2.3C, Wind 2.3 Knots

I’ve posted some new photo’s I took today of humpback’s bubble net feeding which I posted in the Flora and Fauna section. It was a great day for whale activity, and also for barbecuing and cooking as tomorrow is the last day that many of the scientists on station will be around. The Gould arrives at seven in the morning and we will be resupplied with fresh food as well as a new crew of scientists.

February 1: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, 4.4C, Wind 1.7 Knots

It is very cloudy today but is also one of the warmest days that we have had on Station. The warm temperatures are appreciated because there is a lot of loading and unloading of cargo onto the Gould, which arrived this morning. We were on the water and on Torgeson Island all morning filming whales and penguins. The Adelie penguin chicks have grown massively since the last time I saw them and are almost the size of their parents now. They should be learning to swim any day now. It seems impossible, but the smell of the colonies on Torgeson Island has become even worse in the last week. As the chicks grow their parents spend more and more time foraging to feed them, and the amount of excrement around the colonies is phenomenal. Ive posted pictures of today’s hike on Torgeson in the Flora and Fauna section. The red surrounding all of the colonies is a mix of penguin poop and regurgitated krill which spills as the parents feed their young. We had one  curious Adelie hop into our Zodiac while we were on the Island. It looked extremely confused as it hopped around on our gear, and also left us a sloppy red present which we had to clean up. This afternoon will be spent in the kitchen, as we’ve volunteered to help the chefs make a huge amount of pizza’s for the crew of the Gould and the all of the scientists. The event is a tradition before the Gould crosses the Drake Passage. It’s called ‘cross town pizza’ because the dinner used to take place in another building on the other side of the station, but since then the amount of people has increased to the point where the only place it can be held is in the galley. After the Palmer Station band will have a live concert and everybody that has spent the last month at sea will get a chance to relax.

February 8: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Sunny, 2C, Wind 1 Knot

Visibility: Variable, 20-40 ft

It’s been a week since my last entry, and I apologize to those who have been reading and expecting to hear something. The beginning of February was quite cloudy so we spent most of our time checking out new dive sites and re-visiting old ones. We were able to collect some more critters, the most interesting of which were a GIANT brittle star that I found near the station in Hero Inlet, a Scale Worm, and a trio of very rare and under-studied hydroids.

The species of hydroid we collected is one of the weirdest and most fascinating organisms that I’ve encountered here at Palmer Station. To find it we had to dive to the deepest depth we’re allowed- 130 ft. They begin to appear at around this depth and are found in greater numbers in deeper waters. The organism is called Candelabrum and if you click on the link to the left you will see why, they look like candles! The only way to collect a whole specimen is to use SCUBA because they are extremely fragile. Most descriptions have been from trawled species, and we may be some of the first people at Palmer Station to bring them to the surface intact. Other species in the genus Candelabrum are also found in more accessible areas of the world where they are often collected for illegal sale to the salt water Aquarium market.

Hydroids are not individual organisms, but a colony made of hundreds or thousands of individual Zooids all living together in a superstructure. They are related to corals, which are also a colonial organism inhabiting a common superstructure. What makes these hydroids so amazing is a combination of their soft and delicate appearance, their amazing reproductive structures, and their ability to move their bodies in virtually any direction. Their slow, graceful body movements resemble some sort of primordial dance and are the primary reason that we’ve collected them.

In order to collect these fragile creatures we used a large zip-loc bag. The bag is slipped gently over the slightly buoyant hydroid, which is then detached from the rocky substrate using a dive knife. They bag was then sealed and we gently swam the precious cargo to the surface.

Our goal was to use time lapse photography to record the slow movements of the hydroids. We set up a camera in the darkened aquarium room and set it to take a picture every ten seconds for half a day. The results are pretty spectacular. Sadly I cannot upload movies to this website, but I will be showing the video of this time lapse project during my talk at the Fairbanks School District monthly science lecture.

We were quite surprised to find some weird little orbs floating around in the aquarium after anchoring the hydroids to the bottom. They are small spheres of calcium carbonate covered in long tentacles, and look like nothing I’ve ever seen before. As it turns out, these tentacle studded spheres are not really an individual organism at all but an asexual reproductive structure sent out by the hydroid in order to colonize distant areas. They are extremely strange and one can be seen in the candelabrum picture at the lower right base of the leftmost hydroid. I’ve also posted a picture of one of these structures under the microscope.

On Saturday night I got the opportunity to hike around on one of the Islands after dark, which made for an experience that I wont soon forget. We had the clearest weather that I’ve seen since our arrival in Antarctica and I was finally able to see some of the southern constellations that we’ve been missing; either because it was too early in the season for dark nights or because of cloudy weather. The moon was also visible for the first time since we arrived, and was extremely bright. I’ve posted some of the pictures from that night on the Sunrise, Sunset page. The loss of daylight is a sobering reminder that we only have one week left until our departure on February 15th.

Yesterday we spent some time on Torgeson Island watching Penguins and their chicks. I was able to photograph two chinstrap penguins, which are one of the less common species that we see around station. They are much more friendly and curious than the Adelies and will come right up to you and stare you down. We also visited Breaker Island to photograph a cute and fluffy Giant Petrel chick.

Today Norb was able to get some great ‘over-under’ shots with his underwater camera. The bergs are especially blue, partly because of their recent origin and partly because of the amazing sunlight we had earlier today. Tomorrow the forecast is for 30+ knot winds, so it is likely that we’ll be restricted to Hero Inlet where we can dive without using a Zodiac.

February 8: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Overcast, 2C, Wind 30+ Knots

Visibility: 30 ft

The forecast has held true, and we are grounded today. We were able to go diving in Hero Inlet this morning, an area that has become all too familiar to us during this trip, but seems to be a habitat where we may find an ice fish. During the dive we came upon a large V shaped gauge int he sediment which is known as ‘ice scour’. These gauges occur when large ice bergs are scraped along the substrate by wave action or currents. In rocky areas ice scour will destroy anything that is in the bergs path and a bare area will be left behind. In sandy areas like the bottom of Hero Inlet ice scour can create large gauges that may take a long time to fill in. Other than this interesting terrain feature we did not see anything of great interest. This afternoon I’ve begun to prepare my section of a talk that the team will be presenting to the station later this week.

One dive we did last week that I have not mentioned yet deserves a note. We’ve all seen moraines at the heads of glaciers, which are created through accumulated debris that the glacier leaves behind. Last Tuesday we were diving at the base of a glacier (well away from the actively calving area of course) and were able to swim along a huge morain that had been left behind in the past. The V shaped ridge began at approximately 90 ft deep and extended almost all the way to the surface. It made for a very interesting dive, swimming along the ridge was spectacular as it was covered in algae and invertebrates of all kinds. The water was exceptionally clear and we were able to see along the base of the ridge for at least 60 ft. As we crested the ridge at the end of the dive and began our safety stop we had two unexpected and very curious Leopard seals approach us. They were extremely close to both of us and were checking us out in a non-threatening fashion. One would stay a little bit distant (~15 ft away) while the other would swim right up to us, take a curious look, and swim away. They traded places and repeated this maneuver as we surfaced. Like all seals, they may look sluggish on the surface, but as soon as these animals get in the water it is clear that this is their home- not ours. We immediately began to ascend, removing our dive gear on the way so we could get into the Zodiacs as quickly as possible. Floating on the surface and watching their reptilian shapes cruise by underneath is enough motivation to perform an extremely quick exit maneuver!

February 8: Palmer Station, Antarctica

Weather: Sunny, 4C

Visibility: Endless, no diving though, last day on station

Its hard to believe, but today is our last day at Palmer Station. We were greeted this morning with bright sunshine and wonderfully calm weather which has made our packing/cleaning/organizing frenzy much more enjoyable. Last night we had the most spectacular sunset that I’ve seen since arriving on station. The sky was full of a slowly changing progression of colors, reflected both on the calm waters and the clouds above.

The past few days have been spent creating a permanent home for the critters that we have been collecting for our species guide/ aquarium setup. They now have an efficient and fully functional flow through tank system that should keep them happy for months to come. The Nudibranchs, which are notoriously difficult to keep alive, have been thriving, and two of the most colorful ones appear to be undergoing some sort of courtship ritual. I’ve been observing it throughout the day and will describe it further when I get a chance. We’ve also completed our last few dives around station, visiting some of our favorite sites where the walls are covered in a plethora of invertebrate species, as well as diving our backyard ‘Hero Inlet’ in our continuing search for  the ice fish. We can now officially say that we have not found one of a suitable size for great pictures. Other than this minor  disappointment, Norb has captured some remarkable footage on his HD camera of Penguin fledglings, Giant Petrels, Leopard Seals, Hydroid movements, Krill in the aquarium and various other marine life in the area. I have compiled a list of the most common species we see here in the diving limits around station which will form the backbone to a species guide for the area.

This project has been a fantastic opportunity and I feel privileged to have been a contributor to a National Science Foundation expedition in such a remote area. One of the things that will always amaze me about the Antarctic Peninsula is the contrast between the glaciated mountains which support so little life and the fantastic variety of marine life found beneath these cold waters.

Due to insufficient berthing rooms on the R/V Gould, we depart tomorrow on the Holland America cruise ship ‘Prinzendam’ and will sail for six days to the Argentine city of Buenos Aires. From there we go our separate ways and I’ll return to Fairbanks to continue my graduate work.

I’ll try to post some more during our trip home. Thanks to all those who have been interested in the Project. In mid march I will be giving a lecture in Fairbanks at the monthly High School Lecture series, and may give a talk in Anchorage in the coming months. I’ll post these dates when they are set if anyone is interested in seeing some more of the Photo’s and hearing a first hand account of our experiences at Palmer Station.