Kicking off Field Season 2017
A big HELLO to everyone that is following our blog!
We (Brie and I) are back in Costa Rica and about to start our second field season investigating aspects of the feeding ecology of olive ridley sea turtles (Lepidochelys olivacea) in the Eastern Pacific.
We will sample females along the Costa Rican Pacific coast. Some of them while they are nesting, others while they are still in the water. Our samples this year will constitute mainly of blood samples, morphometrics (body measurements), and indices for reproductive output (egg mass and egg numbers). Just like last year, we will try to follow several females throughout their nesting season by installing VHF radio transmitters on their carapace (back part of shell) and painting them. That way we hope that we will be able to find them again with a receiver and a special antenna while they are nesting during one of the mass nestings in Ostional, as well as when they are chilling out between nesting events. All sea turtles lay more than one clutch of eggs per season, and olive ridleys lay in average two nests.
Additionally, starting in August/September I will start looking for females that are done nesting for this season (I can tell buy checking their ovaries and oviducts with an ultrasound for follicles and eggs), and I will install satellite transmitters to some of them. With these satellite transmitter I hope to be able to follow them on their so-called post-nesting migrations through the Pacific ocean while they are looking for food to fatten up and prepare for their next nesting season.
Below is a map of the tracks of the nine turtles that we tracked in the previous season. You might recognized some of the names from our field blog last year.
THIS YEAR, and I am extremely stoked about that, our tracks will be accessible to the public in real time. We are collaborating with the OCEARCH platform, which is originally tracking sharks, but they have made an exceptions for my turtles. Make sure to check out their website at http://www.ocearch.org/ and save it to your favourites. They also have an app for your phone you can download, so you will always know where our turtles are at a given time.
The next thing I am really excited to announce is that we will try to go LIVE on Facebook with videos throughout the season, whenever possible while we are working. It will give you a chance to accompany us and give you first-hand insights of what we actually do every day. These live events will completely depend on the availability of either WIFI or cell-phone reception, because sometimes we don’t have neither (one of the “downsides” of working in pristine areas ;-) ). The videos will be public on Facebook on my page (Chris Figgener), so befriend me or follow me on FB, or follow me on Twitter (@ChrisFiggener), or subscribe to our blog (link on the right side) and that way you will always know when a new blog post is up, as well as when we will try to go live. We already made a trial run, which you can see here TRIAL VIDEO.....
Brie and I are preparing the season right now, running different errands, visiting the permitting offices, fixing and organizing equipment, and on June 30th we will pick up our first two undergraduate assistants Stephanie Oakley, who is new to the family and who we will introduce to a later point, and one of our beloved assistants from the past year: Hunter Holley.
On July 1st, we will officially kick off the season 2017, and I hope that you will be with us again, living through the ups and downs of our field work, celebrating a good sampling day with us, crying over broken equipment, and morally support us with comments and your follow.
To a good season! Talk to you soon!
