A sacrifice to the weather gods

I'm stuck inside again for the second day in a row, but this time at least its justified. With 40 knot Southerly winds and rain its definitely a day to curl up on the couch (or the lab bench) with a cup of hot chocolate and a good book (or sperm whale photo identification catalog). When your job each day is to take a 6 meter boat 10 miles offshore you can easily become obsessed with the weather. The weather forecasters for Kaikoura are actually quite good at predicting what the weather will do, however they seem to be unable to predict when the weather will arrive. A predicted storm can arrive two days later than expected, or it can happen two days earlier. Calm weather can dissapear in a second to be replaced by large seas and gale force winds. Of course none of this appears in the weather forecast.

Yesterday was a perfect example of the frustration of trying to reconcile the predicted forecast with the current conditions. The forecast for yesterday:

***GALE WARNING IN FORCE*** Northwest 30 knots in the morning rising to Northwest 40 knots late morning changing in the afternoon to Southwest 40 knots. Northerly swell 2m easing. Southerly swell rising to 2m in the afternoon. Rough seas at times.

The actual weather yesterday was slightly overcast with calm clear conditions and slight seas from 5:00am until 4:00pm. Finally a bit of southerly wind started at 4:00pm. The frustration comes from sitting inside all day waiting for strong winds and rough seas to justify my decision to stay on land. Even more frustrating is that each hour that passes the urge to go out increases, but the fear of getting caught in a storm increases as well.

Over the past two weeks we've had 8 days on the water, which isn't too bad until you realize that only one of those was a full day, and the rest were all 3 or 4 hours. I'd like to blame the Bush administration and global climate change, but sadly having a scapegoat doesn't actually change anything. So instead I offer this whiney blog posting as a sacrifice to the imaginary weather gods in hopes that they will accept a whiney tounge in cheek electronic prayer and send some good weather this way. Which brings me to the first chapter of my thesis titled: Blogging for good weather statistically proven as effective as praying to god.

But it could always be worse. At least I've got interesting people to entertain me onshore, and of course there's always heaps of work to be done maintaining the gear, fixing the boat, analyzing data. Marine gear has a nasty habit of breaking at the most inopportune times. So far we've managed to repair the boat trailer lights and jockey wheel, replace the bilge pump, replace a pulley for the hydrophone cable, repair a broken directional hydrophone... twice, and fix housings for the hydrophone time depth recorders. I'll try to post a bit more about the gear and daily work later. Now with all the equipment fixed and ready to go, we just need some good weather!

Fieldwork round 2

Sorry for the long lapse in posting. Unfortunately I'm not likely to improve the situation in the near future, as I'm going back up to Kaikoura for six weeks of field work. Wish I could write more about it, but I've got a lot of packing and organizing to do. I'll try to stay in touch via email, but please don't be offended if I don't reply as quickly(?) as I usually do. Next time I write will most likely be in mid-January, so check back then.

Gone for a jog

So, I got tired of working on my post about Doubtful Sound, so I slapped on an abrupt ending and posted it below. Originally I intended to talk more about the power station as a source of stress for the dolphins, but I have neither time nor knowledge to do it justice. It was going to be a masterpiece like Song for the Blue Ocean or at least worthy of National Geographic, but sadly I lack the motivation.

Went snowboarding with my flatmates last weekend at Cardrona near Wanaka. It was extremely fun and I wish I went earlier in the season because now all the snows melting.

Tomorrow I'm running half of the Moro Marathon here in Dunedin. Its further than I've ever run before, and should be a good time. Looking for a new book to read, and am also taking movie suggestions so leave me a comment if you've got anything good.

Cheers!

Doubtful sound

Coffee Powered

Up at 5:00am, I force down a cup of coffee before I throw my luggage into the back of my tiny Toyota Starlet. Layers and layers of field clothing, polypropylene long johns, polyester windfleece, wool socks caps, rubber boots, -4 degree sleeping bag, camera, and food for three people for two weeks all make their way into the back of the mighty starlet. She sputters to life in the brisk pre-dawn air and in two minutes I'm on highway one heading southwest from Dunedin on my way to Manapouri 300km to the west.

A 5am departure is necessary because the ferry leaves to cross lake Manapouri at 9:45, and the mighty starlet isn't the swiftest thing on the road. I once got her up to 150km/hr (100m/h), but that was downhill with a tailwind :-) Cruising through the darkness is relaxing, and other cars are few and far between at this hour. The engine humms as I twist and turn through the hills and plateaus of central Otago. Down the presidential highway past Gore the sun finally peaks over the hills behind me and starts to shine on the distant mountains ahead.

As I speed on I find myself descending into a world of grey. At first it seems like a bank of fog, but shortly rain begins to pelt the windscreen. No drama here though, I've made good enough time to arrive in Manapouri well before the ferry departs. After a year of travelling and making field trips to various South, its finally starting to feel like I know what I'm doing.

I arrive at the Real Journeys wharf in Manapouri with plenty of time to load everything onto the boat, and drink a flat white (a latte without foam). As I'm loading our groceries onto the boat, Bruce, the captain asks me if I'm another dolphin researcher. When he finds I that I am sort of a dolphin researcher he mutters something along the lines of, "How many researchers do those dolphins need?" I search for a minute for a response, and unprepared for such a confrontation I lamely respond something about the lack of acoustic information, and how it's somehow important to get it.

How many researchers do the dolphins need? Its a surprisingly good question. Flustered and defensive I finish packing my gear on the boat and head back up the gangway. I remind myself that I'm here studying doing my research because its what I want to do. It doesn't matter what Bruce thinks. It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks either, at least I'm enjoying my life. The dolphins may not need me to study them, but that isn't the point. Its a poor justification, and it doesn't sit well with me. Actually it all just plain sucks. I realize that I don't know nearly enough about what is happening in Doubful sound. I don't really know why the dolphins actually need any researchers at all.

Power Station

Its gray in Manapouri as the Fiordland Flyer makes its way across the lake to the West Arm Power Station. The power station is a monumental engineering achievement. It uses the lakes 178m (540ft) elevation to generate the massive amounts of electricity required to run the Bluff Aluminium smelter. The high temperatures required to extract aluminium from the ore require large amounts of energy. The cost of the energy required to separate the ore is so large that aluminium is one of the few non-organic waste products that is actually cheaper to recycle. Nevertheless nearly all of the power generated by the Manapouri Power Station is used to smelt Australian alumina ore.

Australian ships carry their load of alumina ore across the Tasman Sea to Bluff. Back at Manapouri water runs through the power plant it eventually makes its way into the large pipes that will carry it down 178m and through the 10km (6mi) of tunnels to be discharged through the Deep Cove tailrace in Doubtful sound. As the water falls, potential energy is converted to kinetic energy which turns giant turbines that spin coils and magnets and convert kinetic energy into electricity. The electricity travels over 150km to the smelter in Bluff. The smelter converts the Australian alumina ore into aluminium, which is then loaded back into ships and transported and sold all over the world as foil wrap and beer cans.

West Arm Power Plant is a monumental engineering achievement, but that's not only due to the fact that its the largest hydroelectric power plant in New Zealand. The remote location of the plant presented its own engineering challenges, and further difficulties involved drilling 10k straight through a mountain to maintain lake levels. The construction of the plant also required building the most expensive (at the time of construction) road in New Zealand. Furthermore, the notable design features mentioned above arose out of concern for the environment.

The original plans for the power station included building a dam and raising the level of lake Manapouri. This sparked wide public concern, and spawned a massive environmental campaign to Save Lake Manapouri. Without going into all the details, the story ends with the government deciding not to raise lake levels, but instead to build the power plant to operate within the lakes natural levels. Massive environmental damage has been avoided for lake Manapouri, and everyone is happy. Many people think of the Save Manapouri movement as the birth of New Zealand's environmental movement. However until recently little concern has been given to the effects of rerouting the fresh water in Manapouri to the marine environment in Doubtful sound.

The Road Less Travelled

With the Fiordland Flyer docked at West Arm, I transfer my gear and groceries to the Real Journeys bus for transport over Willmot Pass. A patch of blue sky reveals snow capped mountains above and beyond the West Arm Visitor Center. I slap sand flies as they try to bite my fingers and face. They are persistent and even in the winter there is little you can do to avoid bites. I slap them knowing full well that it will make no difference and that my fingers will itch tomorrow.

The punters browse the carefully crafted displays of natural history and geology inside the visitor center, but I hardly have time to load my gear before the bus driver informs me that its time to depart.

A kea (mountain parrot) attracts attention from the punters, and delays departure long enough for me to snap a photo of it. The kea is a highly intelligent bird, and has been called an honorary mammal due to its intelligence. Sadly, like many native bird species, there are few Kea left in the wild. The Kea in Doubtful sound have learned to associate people with a potential meal and this one is no exception.

The punters clamber on, and the bus begins its slow voyage over Willmot Pass. The gravel road with no intersections and no tunnels was, as I mentioned previously, very expensive to build. It connects Deep Cove to West Arm, and it nearly all of the heavy machinery in the Manapouri Power Station was carried over the Pass during the original construction of the plant. Originally taxpayers funded the road, but nowadays the tourism companies such as Real Journeys, and Meridian Energy pay all of the upkeep for the public road. Its just as well, since the only way to actually drive on the road ferry your vehicle across lake Manapouri.


The bus climbs above the clouds to reveal spectacular fiordland views of forests and mountains. The driver, Jim, stops briefly at the top of the pass for the spectacular view of the fiords. Then its a quick drive down the hill to Deep Cove.

The Deep Cove Hostel.

Arriving in Deep Cove, Jim helps me unload my bags. I carry everything into hostel and toss my backpack on the floor. With beautiful sunny weather its no surprise to find the place empty. I wouldn't miss an opportunity to spend such an equisite day on the water no matter who was supposed to be arriving, so I can't blame them.

As I'm strugling to make room for two weeks worth of food in the already crowded freezer, Charlie, the deep cove hostel manager knocks on the door. Charlie recognizes me from my last trip into Doubtful Sound, and knows that I'm a biologist. He tells me that he is going to take a quick drive up the road to take a look at the latest Department of Cconservation (DoC) effort going on in Fiordland. He asks me if I want to tag along, and knowing that I'll have to wait until tomorrow to go out on the water I accept his invitiation. We hop into his car and drive toward the tailrace, where fresh water from Manapouri exists the long underground tunnels and pours into Deep Cove. But DoCs conservation effort has nothing to do with the Manapouri Power Station.

A dozen freshly killed possums hanging to be skinned. Charlie explains that conservation in New Zealand means killing small mammals. Possums, stoats, cats, rats, and goats are all invasive species that humans have brought to New Zealand recently, and they are all considered serious pests that threaten native flora and fauna. With no natural predators the invasives multiply and either outcompete or kill native New Zealand species. Charlie elaborates that DoC spends most of their budget on resource management and not nearly enough on pest eradication. Having lived in national parks his whole life he has been able to see firsthand the damaging effects of invasive species left unchecked. He has also seen the implementation of effective eradication programs. It is clear that he cares a great deal about New Zealand's wilderness and has an earnest desire to preserve every bit of it that he can. His frustration with the current system and conservation efforts is apparent. The dozen possums hanging here were all caught last night. Over the past few weeks over 300 possums were caught and killed in this same area. The possums not only kill native birds such as Keas, but they also damage and can kill the slow growing fiordland trees. Charlie laments that one DoC ranger killing possums is like trying to apply a band-aid to a severed limb.

We return to the hostel and Charlie has work to do. There is a school group coming in on Monday, and things are always in need of repair. The hostel was built as an outdoor education center, and grade school classes are the main clientel. Education is always touted as the true cure for conservation worries, but the cliche runs something along the lines of: what will be left to conserve when these educated children run things?

Doubtful Sound

Doubtful sound is a glacier carved fiord that lies in the southwest part of New Zealand's south Island. The region is appropriately named fiordland due to its many dramatic fiords. In addition to Deep Cove, Doubful sound consists of Hall Arm, Crooked Arm, First Arm, Bradshaw, and Thompson Sound. The marine environment in Doubtful Sound, like the terrestrial environment, is both unique and fragile. While doubtful sound is technically marine and is connected to the Tasman Sea, the large amounts of rain and runoff from the fiords create a freshwater layer that sits on top of the marine environment. This freshwater layer can be several meters deep, and it contains tannins that accumulate from soil runoff. This tannin rich freshwater layer acts like a mirror, and reflects and absorbs much of the sunlight that would normally reach the marine environment. This lack of light in addition to other oceanographic features of the sound means deep water organisms can often be found at rather shallow depths within the fiord.

Slow growing black and red corals, and snake stars are prevalent here, yet species usually found in shallow coastal waters are absent. Spiny lobsters can be found here as well, and there are still a few people who set pots to catch them. However, fishing in Doubtful sound has been limited to recreational fishing, and in recent years there are few people who even do that. With people largely out of the equation, the bottlenose dolphins claim the top spot in the fiordland food chain.

These dolphins are some of the southernmost bottlenose dolphins in the world, and they are bigger than most others of their species. Dolphin research has been conducted in Doubtful sound for over a decade now. Some of the research includes population estimates, vocalization studies, and the effects of tourism. There are currently 53 dolphins that live in Doubtful Sound, and Rohan, the researcher who I'm assisting knows all of them instantly by sight. Dolphins can be individually recognized by markings on their dorsal fins, backs, or sides. While these markings may appear subtle, they are more than adequate to reliably identify an individual dolphin.


Rohan, like me, is doing a PhD in marine science, and has been studying the dolphins for about a year and a half. He's spent over 100 days on the water with the dolphins, and has over 14,000 photographs of dolphin ID shots. Each digital photo has an embedded timestamp, and an associated GPS location, as well as various behavioral and oceanographic observations. His research focuses on the dolphin population structure and habitat usage.

While previous research has shown where the dolphins are seen in the fiord, nobody has studied what the dolphins are doing underwater. An attempt was once made to attach time depth recorders to the dolphins to look at their diving behavior, but the dolphins refused to wear the tags jumping and splashing until the tags came off. Rohan and I are planning to look at their diving behavior with a different approach. We plan to use an array of hydrophones (underwater microphones) to record the dolphins from a number of different locations. The dolphins vocalize and the sounds reach each of the different locations at different times. Using a bit of mathematical wizardry and signal processing, we can use the sound arrival time differences to locate where the dolphins are underwater gain insight into their diving behavior.

Of course this is all easier said than done. The study requires the integration and flawless operation of a large number of very fussy devices. Throw in unreliable weather, and unpredictable dolphins, and it becomes evident that preparation will only take us so far. We'll need a certain amount of luck and patience for the study to be successfull.

Its been a long day, and I'm exhausted. I prepare dinner for myself, Rohan and his wife Nandika in a bit of a delirious state. They've had a full day out on the water and they have circumnavigated the entire fiord. I hope the beautiful weather holds, but in Doubtful sound there's really no way to know what weather tomorrow will bring. Sunny cloudless days are a rarity in this temperate rainforest.

After dinner I attach the time depth recorders to the hydrophone array. It is a gesture of optimism towards the weather and dolphin gods. The time depth recorders allow us to know the position of each hydrophone, which is important when trying to localize the dolphins. My experience with the gear is the reason for making the trip, and despite being ridiculously tired I sort out the recording gear so that it will be ready to go first thing in the morning. Its 9:30pm when I finish and I climb into my sleeping bag on the bottom bunk of my private room and fall asleep before my head even hits the pillow.

Nemo

Again I'm up at before sunrise --well sort of anyway. Its 7:00am, but the sun has yet to make itself visible over the steep walls of the fiords. Toast and boiled eggs for breakfast, we pack our lunch and cart the gear down the steep hill to the beach where Nemo is tied up. Nemo isn't a clownfish, and its certainly not a dolphin tied up at the beach.

Nemo is our 5 meter lasercraft aluminium research vessel. I get a kick out of calling these small boats research vessel, but technically its true. Nearly all of the marine mammal work done through the New Zealand Dolphin and Whale Trust is conducted on small boats like Nemo and Grampus, and it just goes to show that you don't necessarily need a huge ocean going behemoth to conduct quality research on dolphins and whales.

Gear loaded, wrapped in many layers feeling like the michelin man, we shove off from the beach and set out to find the dolphins. Cruising at 20 knots, the 50hp outboard drones and my eyes fill up with water. Its still too dark to wear sunglasses, but the cloudless sky is encouraging. On days like today the fiord feels more like a lake than the ocean. The water is glassy, and at times looks like a perfect mirror. I've seen several photos where it is impossible to determine which is the mountain and which is the reflection, though I've yet to encounter such conditions myself.

When its clear and calm like this, spotting dolphins becomes relatively easy. Their blow is rather obvious, even from a great distance, and with little wind, it hangs in the air longer. Rohan tells me that he has been finding the dolphins further from Deep Cove than usual on this trip. Even though it means longer days on the water, Rohan is pleased that he hasn't lost any dolphins since the last trip. All of the dolphins have been accounted for and photographed, including three new calfs from this year.

With such a small population size and a low reproductive rate, a loss of a single dolphin is a big deal. Rohan informs me that the dolphin population here has been declining, and is down from 71 individuals when research began in Doubtful sound. He has also observed two stillborn births this year, and two dolphins have gone missing earlier in the year. Rohan explains that at the current rate of decline by 2050 it is unlikely that there will be any dolphins left in Doubtful Sound.

Off in the distance I spy dolphin blow and point and shout. We slow down, and Nandika gets the camera ready. I tend to the recording gear, making sure that it is ready for fast deployment. While we'll spend hours with the dolphins, all of the field gear has to be deployed quickly and precisely, or else the measurements are likely to be worthless. The dolphins are constantly on the move, and rarely spend significant amounts of time in a single location. We slow down to approach the dolphins, and gently ease in along side of the group in order to get side on shots of the dorsal fins for photo ID.

While the ocean is generally flat and calm when photographing dolphins, the steep mountain walls of the fiords and nearly constant cloud cover make the lighting less than optimal for taking fantastic pictures. Again, this illustrates the advantage of using both photo ID and acoustics to study these animals. Audio quality isn't affected by clouds, though rain sounds particularly interesting underwater.

After a reasonable bout of photography we pull away from the dolphins and decide on a strategy for recording them. Since the dolphins rarely stay put for very long, we try to get ahead of them so that we will be able to record them as they move towards us. It is vital to be ahead of them during recording because their vocalizations are highly directional.

It is a guessing game, and as I said earlier it involves a bit of luck to get a good recording of the dolphins. The trick is to not only guess their direction, but to guess how far ahead to go. If we don't go far enough, we won't have time to deploy all three hydrophones before the dolphins pass us. If we go too far the dolphins might change direction without us seeing it. To add another layer of difficulty, we must deploy our deepest hydrophone to 100m depth, yet there are many places in the fiord where the depth becomes shallow very rapidly, so we've got to constantly check the charts and the echosounder to make sure that our delicate hydrophone doesn't become a sediment sampler or even worse an anchor!

All of the failure points can make getting good measurements seem impossible, but I'm confident that the gear will work, and I'm confident that once we have the recordings we'll have a new window into the world of the bottlenose dolphins in Doubtful Sound. That confidence changes the challenge from an intellectual exercise into an exercise in patience. Even though we might not get a recording this time, I know that if we keep trying it will happen. Acoustic studies have a lot less immediate gratification than photo ID studies. While, I can think of very few things that are as amazing as watching the dolphins while listening to them click, whistle, bray and splash, it takes a long time to download the time depth recorders, time align the recordings, hydrophone depths, and gps tracks, analyze the sounds at each hydrophone, and compute a dolphin location.


While determining how deep the dolphins dive is important to understand how the dolphins live, it doesn't directly contribute to their conservation. The list of potential threats to the dolphins is surprisingly short, so why then are the dolphins still declining? Potential threats include: habitat changes due to fresh water from the Manapouri power station, stress from dolphin tourism, or natural decline due to reasons we don't yet understand. While fishing and bycatch are threats to other dolphin populations, there isn't anyone fishing or catching dolphins in doubtful sound. Pollution is also another threat to many coastal dolphin populations, however fiordland is a relatively pristine location (especially in terms of chemical pollution).

Previous scientific studies have shown that dolphin tourism alters the behavior of the populations that were measured over both short and long time scales. The approach of tourist vessels made the dolphins less likely to continue their current behavior, and more likely to travel. Longer term trends of the dolphins in Milford sound have shown seasonal variation in the dolphins location that inversely correlate with the location of tourist vessels. Lastly a study in Shark Bay Australia has shown that dolphins have a lower birth rate when they are exposed to high levels of tourist activity. So what steps has the New Zealand Department of Conservation taken to protect the dolphins in Doubtful Sound?

There are a handful of companies in the tourism business in Doubtful sound. While there are generally only a few boats giving tours, they do operate year round weather permitting. The highlight of many of these tours includes getting to see the bottlenose dolphins. Is it possible that these tourist operations are causing undue stress to the dolphins? The above research would clearly indicate this is a serious possibility.

After a week in the field, just as we started to get the hang of getting good multi hydrophone recordings of the dolphins, one of the hydrophones broke. It was a manufacturing defect in the cable that caused a short across the power supply and data wires. It means having to cut my trip short and address the broken gear back at the marine mammal lab where we have the tools and technology to rebuild it. We can always make another hydrophone if it breaks. We can't replace the dolphins once they are gone.

Whale Song Artwork

I have recently been informed that visual representations of whale songs are now being considered artwork (thanks for the link Nick). I never knew that I was an artist, but in this digital world apparently it doesn't take much to call something art.

[WARNING IMAGE IS OVER 3MB IN SIZE AND MAY TAKE A LONG TIME TO DOWNLOAD CLICK WITH CAUTION]

(Bandwidth generously donated without consent from Miller's Rexall Inc.)

This image is a spectrogram of a humpback whale song. Unfortunately I wasn't lucky enough to make this recording, but I am lucky enough to work in a place where these sort of things are lying around on the shelf with various other sounds. I created the image for a lecture about dolphin and whale sounds, but now instead perhaps I'll start my own virtual art gallery. I'll let you decide whether its the gallery or the art that is virtual.

Its easy to read the spectrogram: Time is on the horizontal axis, while frequency is on the vertical axis. If you were to print this image as it is, it would be nearly 1cm of paper/second of recording. The colors represent the amount of energy in each frequency band for each unit of time. Its very similar to reading music -- the vertical axis is the staff, and the blobs of color are the notes. White blobs are louder than green blobs are louder than yellow blobs. The higher up on the vertical axis, the higher the pitch.

I'm still planning on posting pictures and an article about my trip to Doubtful Sound, but its taking longer than I planned. The whole place has an interesting story to tell, so I'll do my best to tell it as I saw it, but with a limited amount of free time it could take a while.

Music online

I have been using last.fm for a while now, and I think that it is a neat service. It is a social music service that collects your musical habits (but not personally identifiable information) and compares your tastes with other users. Thought you had ecclectic tastes? Well there's likely someone out there with similar wierd listening habits, and they might just have a new artist you never knew you liked. It works with most music players out there too.

I'm sure there are other services out there that do similar things, but last.fm has been at it for a while, and the website allows for tremendous wastes of time. Its also slightly less ugly and clunky than myspace. Just thought I'd mention it in case anyone was wondering about the track lists in the sidebar.

I'm back from the Doubtful Sound early due to broken gear, but I'll write more about that later. Enjoy.

Deep thoughts

Sorry for the misleading title for those of you who were expecting something along the lines Saturday Night Live's Deep Thoughts by Jack Handy, but I won't be posting any quotations tonight.

Actually, I apologize for the misleading first sentence as I've changed my mind.

Also, forgive me for the lack of content in this post, and forgive me for apologizing so much.

Down to business. I'm going on a field trip tomorrow and will be away from phones, computers and grocery stores for the next two weeks. I'm going to Doubtful Sound, and I'll be staying at the Deep Cove Hostel there. Doubtful sound is a lovely place, and I am looking forward to the taking pictures of the fiords and making audio recordings of the bottlenose dolphins who live there. Hopefully I'll have some pictures to post when I return on 18 August.

Here's a deep thought:

"It takes a big man to cry, but it takes an even bigger man to laugh at that man."


-Bri

Work work work work work

Work is a funny word. Its one of those words that if you say it over and over and over again a lot of times in a row it just starts to sound funny and meaningless. Try it:

work, work work, work work work work
, work work, work, work, work work


Totall ridiculous right?

I've been doing a lot of work lately. I like my work however and often it is quite a bit of fun. Sometimes I talk with people who also enjoy their work, and its nice. Often you can end up in a situation where you both try to outdue eachother and it can get ridiculous.

: Well I love my job so much I would do it for half my salary.
:: Oh yeah, well I love my job so much I would travel 8000 miles and pay $3000 a year so that I could do it!

I call it work, but really I'm still a student. When I graduate I will be able to get paid for the same work -- even though I've already graduated and have been paid to do similar work elsewhere.

Working in marine science will not make me wealthy, but hopefully I'll get to travel to a lot of cool places. Working on dolphins and whales won't make me famous, but it might make it easier to pick up hippie chicks at a bar.

It might go down something like this:

[Wavy lines and fade to bar scene]

So, you're a freelance acupuncturist? [trying really hard to keep a straight face] Thats fascinating. I work with dolphins and whales. Well actually I work with sperm whales.
No, they aren't the ones that sing. They just make clicking noises.
No, I'm not trying to figure out what they are saying.
Well, actually no thats the walrus, but they are called sperm whales because the old whalers used to think that their large heads were filled with sperm, when actually they are filled with a fatty tissue that is used --
What do you mean you have to leave you just got here?
But I'm pretty sure you didn't come in to the bar with those people.
Right, well I'm glad I didn't offer to buy you a drink then.

Yikes, I need to work on my technique! Maybe if I spent less time at work and more time actually interacting with real people I would have more luck.

Work work work work work work work work kwerk kwerk kwerk

*** UPDATE 30 July 2006 ***

Maybe it just feels like I work all the time becaue I can't ever remember my weekends... didn't need those braincells anyway.

Next Stop: Guantanamo Bay

Thats it. I'm officially done for. The men in dark suits and mirrored sunglasses are going to lock me up for good. What chance do I really have? It all started when I decided to renew my New Zealand student visa. I didn't think much of it at the time, but New Zealand requires me to submit a copy of my criminal record (or lack thereof) as a part of my visa application. In order to do this, I had to submit a copy of my fingerprints to the FBI to keep my good name clear. I'm certain that they've already flagged me as a potential terrorist -- I mean I've checked out library books in the USA such as The Monkeywrench Gang by Edward Abbey, Dude Where's my Country, by Michael Moore and Ishmael by Daniel Quin, though I'm pretty sure that the last one makes me a crackpot rather than a terrorist. Anyway, with the PATRIOT act providing my subversive reading habits, my prints on file, and my clear intentions to spend time in [gasp] liberal leaning New Zealand, I probably shouldn't even bother going back to the USA. Doesn't it bother anyone else that Fuhrer Bush has blocked the nsa phone tap inquiry? How can that action be anything other than a cover up? Who stands to lose by disclosing that information? Its not like its all that difficult to get a warrant for a wiretap anyway -- especially if the persone who you want to listen to is actually suspicious.

I don't think I have much time to write now. I thought I saw this black suburban with ultra tinted windows following me earlier, and now there is an unmarked white van outside the building. I don't think that the FBI would do anything to me while I am in New Zealand, but perhaps I aav favfgklj;fdsa
.
.
.

Introducing Max Power!

Queenstown is one of the most visited tourist towns in New Zealand. A short three hour drive from Dunedin means easy access for a day or a weekend. Queenstown is a melting pot for extreme sports.
Bungi jumping, skydiving, paragliding, whitewater rafting, are all routine activities in Queenstown, in addition to regular run of the mill sports like snowboarding, skiing, and pub crawling, and championship ping pong. Today we bring you exciting photos from one of the hottest up and coming super extreme sports in existence -- the moderate-speed, upright, downhill, luge.

I'm sure you are all thinking, 'Sure moderate-speed luging is dangerous and has some of the best looking groupies of any extreme sport, but after I become a MUD luge champion, which breakfast cereal will carry my mugshot as an endorsement of its extremeness?' so I won't hold you in suspense. There are no endorsements for road luge. Top MUD luger TimTam Milo explains, "A lot of lesser sports need sponsorship, but the exquisite physique and poor hygeine of a moderate-speed luger renders this an impossibility."

Check out these death defying photos of moderate-speed luging.

Greatest accomplishment (a haiku)

...three, two, one. we have
liftoff. velcro, foam pillows
knowledge perspective

Now ad-free! With 33% more incoherent rambling!

Writing from home as I stare out the large glass doors at the harbor. Its twighlight out and the rain and fog is slowly rolling in. With the street lights on before dusk and the broad view over Dunedin it somehow manages to avoid looking gloomy. It doesn't look cozy though either. Its easy to describe how the city doesn't look. Withdrawn is a word that springs to mind. Perhaps a bit homesick.

Feeling a bit stressed at the moment, as I have been applying for scholarships again. Otherwise life is pretty good.

I found myself missing Home Depot today. Home Depot is pretty much the last thing I would expect to miss about the states, just slightly behind Wal-Mart. Here in Dunedin the Mega Mitre 10 is meant to fill the DIY home and building niche, but unfortunately it doesn't quite live up to home depot.

Mega Mitre 10 is stocked with dozens of things that are close but not quite what you want. For example, I wanted to add a towel rack or towel hook to my bathroom, and could find various racks and hooks, all of which totally suck. The have only one size of PVC pipe, and no threaded end caps. They sell really nice circular power saws, but stock only the crappiest hacksaws. However, they have a lovely cafe inside the store near the garden section. I ate at the Mitre 10 cafe with my flatmates this morning and had quite a lovely breakfast. Scrambled eggs on ciabbata toast with a perfectly done hollandaise sauce. Funny that the best thing at the hardware store is the food.

I miss Boston a lot too, especially because summer in Massachussetts is lovely. I think what I really miss is the easy access to shore diving -- even if there is hardly anything to see. Last year at this time I was spending most of my free time up in Gloucester, MA scuba diving in lovely Folly Cove (don't mind the garbage on the shore, its nice underwater).

Went for a walk with my flatties after breakfast to climb Mt. Cargill (690m), but the weather quickly turned gray and rainy. Its nice getting out, and I've always maintained that exercise is the best hangover cure (Drank a bit too much last night). I love the cloud forests here. And the bellbirds are definitely my favorite birds to listen to.

My PhD is now in full swing and its becoming tricky to stay afloat. I have never worked this hard on anything in my life, but I'm thoroughly enjoying it too. When I was in school I only did the minimal amount of work that I had to do to get by. I could do less here and still get by, but I wouldn't be satisfied -- its my project and its success, failure, and quality ultimately depend on me. I know many people get burnt out when doing their PhD and I can totally see how that happens. I'm not close to burning out yet, but there is no shortage of work ahead for me and I can't see how I'll ever actually finish it all.

To Lazentaters and BS King (names not changed to protect the innocent), I enjoy reading your blogs very much. Its easy to read and pretend I'm in the same room. Makes me laugh a lot too. Good stuff. Wish I could be funny too, but sadly I'm only funny when I try to be serious.

Tried to take a picture of a rainbow as viewed from my porch, but it came out crappy. Photography is tricky for me, and I have much respect for those who are good at it.

I am happy to report that thanks to donations from viewers like you, future postings will be ad-free. I'm sure you are all relieved.

Back to the lab

Sadly my winter field season has come to an end. It was a lovely 4 weeks up in Kaikoura, but now I've returned to cold and cloudy Dunedin. Some of the highlights of the trip include the 3 humpbacks that we saw passing through on their migration, as well as a sperm whale spyhopping and lunging out of the water. Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of the sperm whale when it was leaping up out of the water, but I did manage to take a few pictures of the humpbacks. I've posted the pictures into my photo-album on flickr, so feel free to have a look.

Winter fieldwork pictures

I would have liked to spend another month in the field, but its important that I actually analyze the results and use that information to improve our methods and instruments. So I'll spend the next few months working in the lab trying to make sense of the 35 gigabytes of recordings that we made. All in all I believe it was a great success, and it would not have been possible without the extensive help of my supervisors Steve Dawson and Liz Slooten.

Also in Kaikoura I got to see my friend Rio Rossellini. Rio is an artist who draws lovely pictures of marine life. You can check out her artwork on her website listed below.

Rio Rossellini's Artwork

I'll keep this short because I'm tired and have unpack and get some food before the hills here get too frosty to drive on. Gotta spend time in the sun while its shining here in gray cloudy Dunedin.

Fieldwork - Winter 2006

So its been a while since I've posted anything, and that is because I've been in the field making recordings and taking pictures of the sperm whales. Sperm could possibly be one of the goofiest looking creatures on the planet. Don't get me wrong, I really enjoy my work and think that they are fascinating and amazing creatures, however interesting and goofy are not mutually exclusive. Unfortunately my pictures don't really capture the true nature of the sperm whale, so here goes:



Sperm whales look like crooked, brown, wrinkly logs that float and bob at the ocean surface. Their blow hole is offset forward and to the left, and their dorsal hump is also off-center. They have brown wrinkly skin which gives them a jumbo-rasin like texture. They don't often have much of their body above the water, and are therefore difficult to photograph, however when beginning a deep dive, they raise their flukes above the water as they angle nearly straight down towards the ocean floor, in much the same way a skin diver would. The flukes of each whale are very distinct and fluke photographs are used to uniquely identify individual whales. This guy has a little hole on the right hand side near the center of the fluke. Also in a more abstract yet practical sense, the nicks, scallops, and tips of the tail can be used to create inkblots for use in psychological testing.



Sperm whales are the largest of the odontocetes, or toothed whales and they are mesopelagic teuthivores, which in biologish means they eat squid that swim in the middle of the water column, though they have also been known to eat midwater fish and various benthic creatures. Contrary to popular belief the sperm whales here do not feed exlcusively on giant squid. In fact studies have shown that they prefer to eat arrow squid, which are actually a small species of squid compared to the size of the sperm whale.



The sperm whales here in Kaikoura are mostly subadult males, meaning that they are sexually mature but can't score with the female whales. They spend most of their days making loud clicking noises that scienticians generally agree are used either for echolocation, or to provide a percussive metronome to keep other more melodic species of whales singing at the proper tempo. Either way, they are extremely loud and can be heard many nautical miles away. My research includes recording these echolocation clicks from multiple hydrophones to triangulate the whales position, which of course is easier said than done. In addition to that, I'm working on creating a musical instrument based on the theremin to convert interpretive dance into whale song. Just think of the possibilities!



Kaikoura is my field location, and it is one of a few places in the world where the sperm whales regularly come close to the shore. This means that we can use small boats to get close enough to the sperm whales to record them and take their pictures. It also means that I get to sleep in a warm bed on dry land each night.



The first week of June we had amazing weather, and spent 5 full days on the water from sunrise at 8:00am until about 4:00pm, and in addition to many sperm whales. We also saw a group of approximately 300 highly acrobatic dusky dolphins.



I've also been fortunate enough to see killer whales here in Kaikoura. The sperm whales didn't seem too bothered by the killer whales when they were here, however there have been other reported instances of killer whales attacking and killing smaller sperm whales. Like most great nature documentaries I am now guilty of creating tension by taking footage from two different places and times and editing such that they appear to be happening at the same place and time. Except I didn't do a great job of it here because the orca is clearly near shore, while the whale is clearly miles from shore. Yes the lighting is totally different too. If you are actually wondering, I took the photo of the orca in Te Wai Wai Bay (hundreds of miles from Kaikoura) in March, and I've flipped it around so it appears to be facing the sperm whales on the opposite of the page. Probably would have worked better if I had at least attempted to match the backgrounds of each photo.

We operate on a small boat called Grampus. Its a 6 meter aluminium boat with a 100 horsepower Yamaha outboard. Even loaded with tons of gear there's still enough space for the essentials such as chocolate, coffee, and dried apricots. The amount of gear can seem ridiculous at times, but each instrument gives a vital piece of information.

You see, in addition to taking pictures of sea creatures, my research includes throwing these various expensive scientific instruments over the side of the boat and into the deep blue yonder, waiting for some period of time to pass, and then pulling them up back onto the boat again. After sitting in front of a computer for a some amount of time, I then interpret the meaning of it all. So far the most likely meaning of it all is that I must be crazy -- not a real shocker.

Seriously though, I like all of the cool toys that I get to play with. I get to listen to the whales on our three omnidirectional hydrophones, or track them with a directional hydrophone - all built in house. I get to measure the depth of the instruments with a scuba computer which is always telling me that I need to decompress. I get to use the expensive CTD to measure conductivity, temperature, and depth of the ocean, which is all necessary to estimate the speed of sound. Throw in a GPS and echosounder and its a party! And all the while, the whales keep clicking away while we record them directly to a laptop hard disk for posterity.

A wee tramp to the beach

Saturday I went with my flatties to my favorite local beach at Sandfly Bay. The photo I posted shares a title with my favorite Guster song, Long Way Down.

The song is about putting a relationship into perspective, and for me going to the Sandfly bay is also about perspective. Looking down at the path, the flax and fields, the beach and rocky cliffs, the waves and the southern ocean, and seeing how small the people are makes me wonder exactly how does it all fit together. What is the proper perspective for assessing a person's relationship with the environment? I've heard about a book called White as the Waves, which is a retelling of Moby Dick from the perspective of the whale. It hardly seems possible that in 150 years man's relationship with nature could have changed so much...

Did I mention that sometimes the people here make me feel a bit conservative? More about that later though. Its late here, and I've got hours of sperm whale recordings to listen to tomorrow...

Move to Dunedin!

Its not often that I listen to ads on TV, but the other day I noticed a particularly annoying ad which was attempting to convince people to "move to Dunedin". You immediately have to wonder about the quality of life of any city that has to advertise...

I've been in Dunedin for about 5 months now, and must say that it is starting to grow on me. Here is a picture of my house (nicknamed The Castle), which overlooks a large part of Dunedin. That's the Southern ocean in the background. The yard needs a bit of work, but with a view like this, how much time would you really spend looking at the yard?
I've decided to use Flickr to host my photos online, so feel free to check out additional photos of The Castle.


On an unrelated note, I saw The DaVinci Code last night, and was disappointed. I suspected that it would succumb to the classic "wasn't as good as the book" dissapointment, so that wasn't a surprise. It seems like the director was unable to understand that a best selling book does not a screenplay make. The interesting ideas about christianity weren't given enough substance to be interesting on their own, but they were given just enough screen time to be totally boring. A bit like this blog entry eh?

On that note, I'm off to bed. I've got a big week ahead of me, and plenty of work to do before I head up to Kaikoura for the Winter field season. Peace out.

New Flatmates...

I've finally got a new camera thanks to my Mom and Dad! Now all I need to do is learn how to actually use it. In the meantime I've managed to find a (semi)-willing subject to shoot. Its my new flatmate, Possum, tentatively eating out of my hand. Isn't she gorgeous? Unfortunately she is afraid of men, so the only way that I can get her to come near me is by bribing her with her treats. So yeah, people joke about the losers who have weblogs and post pictures of their cats, or what they ate for dinner, or other lame and uninteresting things -- well I'm a step down from that because I'm posting a picture of someone else's cat. But hey, its better than nothing... or is it? Hopefully there will be more photos to come, and maybe someday I'll even have something interesting to write about. But for now, you'll look at Possum and you'll like it!

Movies I wouldn't even reccomend to my worst enemies

I have a very good friend who shall remain nameless so as not to impugn her taste in movies. But this friend and I had an unfortunate habit of seeking out movies that happened to be subpar. Anyone can pick and enjoy an AFI top 100 film, but we were looking for the underdogs -- something overlooked by the unwashed masses. But in all this searching the only thing I found is that there is a lot of crap out there, yet even shitty movies can be fun if you watch them with the right company. Anyway, this is my first blog post and I'm hoping to post pictures of my favorite New Zealand locations once my new camera arrives. Have any others that I should avoid at all costs?

Cube
Doom
Jane White is Sick and Twisted
Batman (1966)
Notting Hill