How I spent today

Well, I spent it playing in the mud. Actually, it was more like running mud through my fingers, sieving the mud, and then looking for critters that aren't supposed to be in this area of the coast. It was a good day on the water handling all types of gear like trawls, plankton nets, and dredges (shown below).

There's really nothing like being out on the water working. I stay in my office a lot more than I like most of the time, so it's a real treat to be able to get paid to do something that I love to do, be on a boat.

We found four invasive invertebrate species today. The neatest find of the day came from an abandoned crab pot that was encrusted with a number of species. There were hundreds of an invasive isopod (a member of the crustacean group). And inside the trap were several large stone crabs that had legal sized claws. We had stone crab claws tonight as an appetizer for dinner cooked at the field station.

That's what drew me to this work: the thrill of finding the unexpected. And tomorrow is another day of unexpected things, just like in life in general.