Wednesday, May 13, 2009

#12: Packing Fish All.... Night.... Long....

We pulled an all-nighter last night. Haven't done that since college. The fish had a flight at 7 am this morning, so we started packing them at 11 pm last night and worked straight through until they got dropped off at the airport. The packing of fish was a well oiled machine and everyone was working non-stop.

Susan and Lionel were setting up boxes. Terry was filling bags with water


Chris, Scott and I were catching (or should I say re-catching) the fish from their tanks.



Jeremy was putting fish into the correct sized bags



Sean was running bagged fish over to get sealed off




Sherrie and Captain Lou were adding pure oxygen to the bags and sealing them off

Deb was marking the Styrofoam boxes with the kind of fish packed in them. Don and Russ were cross referencing what fish had been packed with our collecting log. Captain John was stacking the Styrofoam boxes into cardboard boxes and sealing them up.

We finished packing all but four of the fish in about 4 hours. Of course the last four were the biggest fish we had, and the most challenging to pack up.

Remember those two white spotted file fish I was so excited about? And how one of them got close enough that I could see it's teeth? Well those teeth were great at biting through the bag, and it drains the water out. The problem was finally solved by drilling holes in a bucket and submerging it in a bag with water ... after trying a few other things that didn't work. That was another one from yours truly, the Tufts alumni Chris Doller.


The cowfish (above) and the barracuda are big, and can also bite through their bags, but layering cardboard between the layers of bags seemed to work for them.

All the boxes of fish made it safely to the Aquarium and will be in quarantine for at least 6 weeks to watch for any parasites that we wouldn't want to spread to our exhibit. After that you may start to see some of the more obvious fish go on exhibit ... the file fish, the barracuda, the cowfish. But be on the lookout for some of the more under appreciated animals, like the beautiful sponges, feather dusters and tunicates.

The participants on this trip have gone home. For staff the rest of the trip is mostly cleaning the boat and packing away all our gear.

I'm going through a bit of withdrawal from scuba diving and all the participants I've lived with for the past 11 days, so I'm going to ease myself off it a bit by posting some more short stories and great pictures from the trip that haven't made the blog yet over the next few days. So I'm not done yet, keep checking back.

-Bronwyn

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posted by NEAQ at 7:18 PM 1 Comments



Thursday, September 25, 2008

Blog #14: Coming Home

My day today started at 2:45 a.m. I have to admit that the first couple of minutes of getting up were challenging but the excitement kept my eyes open. By 4 a.m. the music was blaring and everyone was at their stations.

The basic process of boxing up the fish goes as follows: We have four people to re-catch all of the fish out of their tanks bucket by bucket.



Depending on the size of the fish those people then scream down to the two box people who prepare a box with a Styrofoam container and all right sized bags for the fish. The box and bags then head to the water pourer who allocates the perfect amount of water in each bag before the fish get placed in. When the box has all of its fish it is handed over to the bagging table where two people fill up the rest of the bag with pure oxygen and seal it with a special rubber band.



Then the fish are identified and one person writes it all down, puts a number on the box, and brings it to the packers. These two people box up the Styrofoam containers and attach an appropriate label. Lastly, there is one person who records all of the boxed animals and sends an email letting the aquarists in Boston know what to expect.

We worked for several hours, the sun came up, and then we worked several more hours. At around 9 AM we were loading all of the boxes from the boat onto our rented box truck. Sherrie, Pete and I drove all 46 boxes to an airline loading dock and lifted them one more time onto a shipping pallet.



Happily, we waved goodbye to the fish and wished them luck on their 1:50 p.m. flight to Boston. The stress rolled off our shoulders as we drove back to the boat, laughing the whole way about all the funny experiences of the trip. Back at the boat we exchanged high fives, hand shakes and hugs with rest of the team. Now that the participants have left, the staff will spend the next couple of days breaking down the boat before returning home to Boston. But before all that comes a nice, long nap!

One more thing I would like to say before falling asleep for an undetermined length of time. Even though I had a thorough explanation beforehand of what to expect on this trip I had no idea what an incredible experience this would be. I suppose it is hard not to have an amazing time when you are stuck on an 80-foot boat for 10 days with fifteen adventure-loving people who are all there to support the aquarium. We were all fortunate to experience the exhilaration of catching a fish knowing that thousands of people will be able look at with wonder. Beyond that we all renewed our love and appreciation for the three-dimensional world of marine science.

If you are interested in future trips please contact Sherrie Floyd at sfloyd@neaq.org or Sarah Taylor at staylor@neaq.org.

-Megan Moore

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posted by NEAQ at 12:43 PM 2 Comments