Author Archives: katrine

Home, sweet home

I came across these two bristle worms from the genus Nothria whilst sorting out the animals from a sample collected in the Barents sea by the MAREANO project, and wanted to show you how differently they’ve approached the choice of building materials for their tubes. They build the tube around their bodies to protect themselves from predators. Now, a Nothria outside its “house”, or tube, looks like this (scale bar is 2 mm) :

Nothria out of tube

Nothria out of tube

The same animal inside its tube looked like this:

Typical tube

Typical tube, built out of sand grains and small rocks

And then there was this one, who had made a more select choice of building materials:

Fancy edition; built using empty bivalve shells

Fancy edition; built using empty bivalve shells

Fall cruise with MAREANO

R/V G.O. Sars

R/V G.O. Sars

I’m onboard the research vessel “G.O. Sars”, participating in the last MAREANO cruise of the year. We’re currently on our way back out to the sampling sites after seeking refuge in a fjord from the storm yesterday.

 

 

 

Sampling areas. The yellow area is finished, the brown ones are work in progress. From mareano.no

The area we’re working on is outside Møre & Romsdal, currently we’re on our way to a set of video stations whilst we wait for the sea swell to die down (it’s quite the rollercoaster here at the moment!). We have two-three full stations remaining, hopefully we’ll be able to finish those as well before the cruise ends this Friday.

 

Campod. It has one main HD camera, and two additional cameras to aid in the handling of it.

Campod. It has one main HD camera, and two additional cameras to aid in the handling of it.

“Full station” means that we in addition to videoing the sea floor for a 700m long transect with our remotely controlled video rig, the Campod 2, also collect physical samples.

 

 

 

 

From the video room (the smallest room onboard, and the most crowded!)

From the video room (the smallest room onboard, and the most crowded!)

This is done using a variety of gears, which collectively gives us a extensive insight in the properties of the area we’re working on. On board we have a team of biologists, geologists and a chemist. The geologists and chemist are after sediment cores, which provide a window back in time for analyses of the physical and chemical parameters of the sea floor, including the accumulation of pollution. How far back a core extends will depend on the sedimentation rate, and on how long the core we manage to extract is. 

Multicorer in action

Multicorer in action

The multicorer collects six sediments cores in one go

For collecting animals, we are using three main gears: the epibenthic RP-sled, the beam trawl, and the grab. These collect different parts of the fauna, and (together with the video) gives us a fair understanding of the species diversity and composition.

The grab (a van veen) collects a quantifiable amount of animals exceeding 1 mm in size. We take two grabs at each full station.

The grab (a van veen) collects a quantifiable amount of animals exceeding 1 mm in size living in the sediment. We collect two grabs at each full station.

Incoming grab

Incoming grab

A typical grab sample. We carefully rinse the mud through a 1 mm sieve, collecting the animals within it.

A typical grab sample. We carefully rinse the mud through a 1 mm sieve, collecting the animals within it.

The art of playing with mud and water

The noble art of playing with mud and water

RP sled (left) and the beam trawl. The sled collects the small animals living just above and in the upper layer of sediment. The beam trawl collects the macro- and megafauna living above and within the top layer of the bottom.

RP sled (left) and the beam trawl. The sled collects the small animals living just above and in the upper layer of sediment. The beam trawl collects the macro- and megafauna living above and within the top layer of the bottom.

Beam trawl catch: various starfish

Beam trawl catch: various starfish

Beam trwal catch: sea cucumbers (Stichopus)

Beam trawl catch: sea cucumbers (Stichopus)

Rough!

Rough!

Calm

Calm

We've had some glorious sunrises whilst working on deck

We’ve had some glorious sunrises whilst working on deck 

Fulmars and gulls are alos following us, hoping we'll give up on the small animals and start catching fish for them

Fulmars and gulls are following us, hoping we’ll give up on the small animals and start catching fish for them

Three gannets are also trailing us, they’ve been around since we left Kristiansund. Gorgeous birds!

Now we’ve arrived at the next station, so I’d better get going!

 

Master students are wanted!

wanted

We are currently on the lookout for students interested in doing their Master thesis with us.

If you are interested in learning more, you can look here for some examples of possible topics within polychaetes or marine molluscs.

We’re also interested in students that might want to work with decapods, such as the African crab fauna.

Contact us if you are interested!

Diopatra project - check link for details

Diopatra project – check link for details

The 11th International Polychaete Conference – Sydney, Australia 2013

From the mid-conference excursion to the Royal National Park

From the mid-conference excursion to the Royal National Park. Photo by Katrine

For a hectic week in early August, the Australian Museum in Sydney was swarmed by enthusiastic people in purple hoodies, who kept talking about (bristle) worms.

It was the 11th International Polychaete Conference, with 149 attendants from 26 different countries. We had a strong Norwegian presence there – from the Museum, three of us attended (with talks and posters), as well collaborators of ours from NTNU, NIVA, and Uni Environment.

You can read more about our contributions here (if your Norwegian is up to speed – unfortunately it is not avaliable in English).

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Group photo (courtesy of the IPC 2013 committee)

The conference venue, the Australian Museum

The conference venue, the Australian Museum

From the auditorium

From the auditorium

It was a great week, where we got to meet and mingle with our colleagues from all over the world, learning what they are working on and how, making new connections and meeting up with old friends.

We had a excellent time, and would like to thank the IPC 2013 committee for the fantastic job they did!

The next conference will be in Cardiff, Wales in 2016, we look forward to it. 

Fluid Preservation Course

The Horniman Museum and Gardens

The Horniman Museum and Gardens

Curating a natural history collection comes with many challenges; how do you “freeze” the specimen in such a state that another taxonomist can request to examine it in 10 (20, 30, 50, 100…) years from now, and expect to find the same characters (the traits that are used for determining which species one is looking at) as the one who originally described or determined the specimen?

Which fluid should then be used as a preservative? Here we nee to take into consideration such features as potential harmfulness, fire hazards, longviety, the possible effects on histology and DNA, resistance to pests, effects on the container it is kept in, etc. etc. And how should the samples be stored? How do you rescue objects that have been damaged?

I spent most of last week attending a course in methods for fixing and preserving natural history specimens in fluid; The  «Fluid Preservation Course» was given by Simon Moore at The Horniman Museum in London.

Group.2

The group

Some of the topics covered included

  • different methods and chemicals for fixating  and preserving specimens,
  • how to work with glass (cutting, drilling and grinding), especially how to make lids for jars of various sizes, 
  • how to make and repair objects for display,
  • how to salvage specimens that have been damaged due to dessication, fungi or other perils, 
  • avaliable chemicals and their properties,
  • how to determine which chemicals the animals are stored in
Making a display part 1: One lizard in a bag. Extract from bag, figure out which preservative has been used, transfer to suitable new preservative.

Making a display part 1: One lizard in a bag. Extract from bag, figure out which preservative has been used, transfer to suitable new preservative.

Making a display part 2: preepare speciemen for being mounted in a suitable jar

Making a display part 2: prepare speciemen for being mounted in a suitable jar

Making a display part 2b: Stitch monofilament in to lizard to mount it on a custommmade piece of glass in the jar.

Making a display part 2b: Stitch monofilament in to lizard to mount it on a custom made piece of glass in the jar (it looks rather brutal, doesn’t it?)

Making a display part 3: Ta-da!

Making a display part 3: Ta-da!

A jar stuffed full of turtles and tortoises in really bad condition - we tried to salvage as much as possible, especially one specimen that was of a species they didn't have in the museum collection.

A jar stuffed full of turtles and tortoises in really bad condition – we tried to salvage as much as possible, especially one specimen that was of a species they didn’t have in the museum collection.

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Still not in great condition, but at least we can see what’s in the jar now!

Working with glass

Working with glass

Using vaccuum to extract air from dried-out specimens

Using vaccuum to extract air from dried-out specimens

Dessicated sea horses en route  to rehydration

Dessicated sea horses en route to rehydration

Injecting alcohol in dessiccated specimens to help them rehydrate (and sink).

Injecting alcohol in dessiccated specimens to help them rehydrate (and sink).

A fairly messy jar with spiders (with varying numbers of legs still attached) and a tick

A fairly messy jar with spiders (with varying numbers of legs still attached) and a tick

The spiders have been mounted on monofilament, the jar has been replaced, and they are now stored in 80% alcohol

The spiders have been mounted on monofilament, the missing legs have been re-attached using class needles and colloidin as glue, the jar has been replaced, and they are now stored in 80% alcohol. 

 

Sponges!

Work in progress

Work in progress

We recently had two taxonomists working of the sponges (Porifera) that MAREANO has collected. They picked out specimens that are of particular interest for their own research, and did a (partial) revision on the rest of the material.

 

 

 

Many samples

Many samples

Sorted and labeled

Sorted and labeled

Further work on West African biodiversity

A brittle star, Ophiura ophiura (scale bar is 0.5cm)

A brittle star, Ophiura ophiura (scale bar is 0.5cm)

In addition to the crabs (Brachyura) discussed in the previous post, we are also focusing on animal groups such as the brittle stars (Ophiuroidea) and bristle worms (Polychaeta).

Currently we are preparing samples for genetic barcoding though the BOLD system.

Here are a couple of photographs of the animals that have been through the mill of identification – photo documentation – tissue sampling this week.

A bristle worm from the family Maldanidae, partially encased in the tube that the animal dwells in (scale bar is 0.5 cm)

A bristle worm from the family Maldanidae, partially encased in the tube that the animal dwells in (scale bar is 0.5 cm)

Another and rather different looking bristle worm, this time from the family Onuphidae. Scale bar is 0.5 cm

Another and rather different looking bristle worm, this time from the family Onuphidae. Scale bar is 0.5 cm

 

Launching PolyNor

IMG_6880Earlier this week we went to the Museum of Natural History and Archaeology in Trondheim (NTNU) to initiate the new project “Polychaete diversity in the Norwegian Sea – from coast to the deep sea” (PolyNor). The project is funded through the NBIC, and will run through 2015.

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