This trip was quite different as we got to do the fish/mangrove/insect survey. We collected samples during thse surveys.
The surveys were interesting!! :)
For the fish one, was assigned to do the Clove Oil method of euthanizing and retrieving fish, others were doing seining (with a net) & this time, the casting of net was not used. Anyway, the clove oil can actually 'knock out' a fish, probably due to some active ingredient inside the oil. A small amount of oil (actually it's a 30% clove oil, 70% ethanol mix) is dropped into tidal pools during low tide so that these fishes found in the tidal pools will be knocked out and we can pick them out. Mainly, there were gobies, filefish... However, they also found a rabbitfish, squid and others on the second day. Won't go so much into the preservation stuff too.
Anyway, we had to evacuate fast from the intertidal area on the first day because there was thunder and lightning... The place seemed to be affected by algal blooms as well, which was present in another part of the intertidal area (during the last trip).
For the insect survey, we used a net; waving it in figures-of-eight, we were able to catch insects in the net; insects of varieties: dragonflies - the red one, yellow one, blue one, bee-mimicking one (odonata), butterflies & moths - common grass yellow & its relatives (lepidoptera), bugs (hemiptera), grasshoppers & katydids (orthoptera), ants (hymenoptera), spiders (arachnida) - the crab spiders, long-legged spiders, lynx spider, and we got some caterpillars, wasps, milipedes as well. Surprising how many insects you can find in a small area. After awhile, everything looked kinda the same but the insects are probably different species... Haha. No wonder not many people actually study insects. Presevation was carried out too...
There was BBQ which had pretty yummy food too...
Alright sleepyyyyyyyyy now. Goodbye!
No comments:
Post a Comment