What a day...

Morning, folks! I could not finish this last night. Too much rolling to focus for so long on the screen.

What a day! I have to apologize to Rubén and Alberto for misnaming them in the photos last night, it was Rubén and not Alberto who was in that shift… some mistake after sharing ship for two weeks and a half! Sorry, guys!

We had a bad start today, too bad weather to fish due to a tropical storm further west. We could start after 11 am. We have been in the shallowest area all day so we could choose the best direction to shoot the gear. On the slope we must follow the isobaths and find spots with 1.5 trawlable nm, withouth hills or holes. Difficult in good weather and impossible today.

Nevertheless we got 5 hauls, the first three rather lousy in terms of catches but the last two very good. Yellowtail flounder all day, very clean catches.

Andrés, who walks a lot regardless of time and weather, found on the upper deck this morning a massive moth called Ascalapha odorata. You won’t appreciate in the pic because we took it right atfer capture and none of us thought on having at least a pen for the scale. But it was huge, with an impressive wing span if such term can be used on moths. The Captain says the size of an albatross, I go for 10 cm.

Ascalapha odorata

So we will go on with invertebrates, which deserve much more space that I give them. This was originally a stock assessment survey, but already in 1995 there was talk of the ecosystem approach to fisheries. This means that when assessing marine resources we should consider not only target species, but also their ecosystems, species depending of them and species they depend on. This sounds very obvious but it is also very expensive and difficult. For starters, data collection has increased a lot in many surveys, Platuxa among them. Invertebrates have been registered for years, and identified with as much detail as possible. When in doubt, specimens are photographed and taken to land.

Some invertebrates contribute to the 3-dimensional complexity of the sea bottom, increasing feeding and refuge opportunities for many other species, including many of commercial interest. We could describe them as oasis in the oceanic platform desert. They are also very sensitive to human activities, due to their fragility and very slow growth rates.

This year we have Rai on board, who belongs to that nearly extinct species, the taxonomists. Rai and his friend Teo are two walking encyclopedias when it comes to marine invertebrates. The year they both came to this survey we got an amazing number of identified species. Rai took apart several specimens for me, caught yesterday between 800 and 1000 m, and you can see below some of them. I hoped he could help today to find some fun facts but it was not possible and most of the stuff I find now is too specialised.

Phormosoma placenta

Phormosoma placenta is the name of this sea urchin that of course is much prettier in its habitat, sandy bottoms at more than 500 m depth. It has some kind of bags on its dorsal side that actually are very primitive spines (Emson & Young, 1994).

Stereomastis nana

I haven't found much about this crustacean. It is widely distributed on muddy bottom at depths from 300 to 4000 m and there are no worries about the state of its populations.  I feel much better now.

 

Acanella arbuscula

And this one here looking like a little plant, Acanella arbuscula is actually a bamboo coral. Is a good example of sensitive species with a 3D structure. Its growth rate is 11 to 75 micrometers (a thousandth of a milimeter) per year (Sherwood & Edinger, 2009).

And unfortunately I must drop it here. Too tired and too much rolling...