Ecology at SPS: 2008

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Pollock Fisheries Crashing!

Alaska's Bering Sea
We've been warning for years that the Bering Sea's pollock fishery - the world's largest - is suffering from overfishing. We've been called everything from crazy to exaggerating for making this claim about a fishery that has been held up as a model of sustainability. But news this month confirms our worst fears. The pollock population has plummeted by almost 50% in just one year. Pollock is the very foundation of the Bering Sea's food chain, feeding everything from the endangered Steller Sea Lion to fur seals. In fact, baby fur seals are already washing up dead in the Pribilof Islands, and scientists hypothesize that their deaths are caused by starvation.
Take Action !

As a class, we have already "seen" this scenerio in the video Mystery in Alaska. If you have not seen this PBS documentary, it is a MUST SEE for anyone who is interested in fisheries management, the importance of Keystone species within an ecosystem, and how scientists are working with and industry to find a "win-win-win" scenerio - a sustainable future for all!

The North Pacific Fisheries Management Council will vote this month to set fishing limits on pollock! <https://webmail.sps.edu/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://members.greenpeace.org/action/start.php?action_id=161>

Thursday, October 30, 2008

Slideshow of Fall Fieldwork

Below is a PowerPoint slideshow of the field work completed thus far. Click through the slides at your own pace. Enjoy!

Fall Slideshow Of Field Project Work

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own.

Friday, October 3, 2008

Water Sampling at Lower School Pond

Below are pictures of our first field experience....Let's just say some people should stick to dry land....

Our Sampling Site

Water anaylsis included DO, temperature, nitrates, phosphates, pH, turbidity and conductivity.

The "maiden" voyage with the canoes behind the Hockey Rink.

Friday, September 19, 2008

Welcome to our Ecology Blog!

This is a new advanced Biology course offering at St. Paul's School. We are fortunate to have almost 2000 acres on the school grounds, through which the Turkey River flows to the Merrimack River as a background for our studies. Students will spend time in the field collecting data and assessing the water quality of our watershed. We are interested in nutrient load, diversity of species within our part of the watershed, soil impact to name a few. We are also partnered with the Upper Merrimack River Program, through the NH DES, to help as part of their volunteer team in data analysis of macroinvertebrates that are found in a prescribed length of the watershed.

Fall Term- Limnology of the Turkey River Watershed

The fall term will focus on learning the core foundations and concepts of ecology using our school grounds / watershed. It will include an introduction into geology, physical geography and the abiotic processes that influence ecosystems. We will begin by investigating and starting, long-term data collection of our Turkey River watershed to develop an understanding of ecological concepts. Concepts that will be covered include energy flow through ecosystems, diversity as a measure of stability, the interconnectedness between abiotic and biotic factors within an ecosystem.

Winter Term- Marine Ecology

Since our SPS freshwater ecosystem will eventually connect to the Gulf of Maine, it is important to understand how different ecosystems are interconnected. Although we are not located at the NH seacoast, field trips will be taken in both the winter and spring terms to allow students to have first-hand knowledge and field experience with local marine systems. It is hoped that the UNH Jackson Laboratory at Great Bay, the Seacoast Science Center in Rye, NH and the Boston Aquarium will be field trip sites that will allow us to study the Atlantic (Gulf of Maine) marine environment and the issues that it faces.

Course work in the winter term will include mini-projects, research, and presentations that focus on a variety of marine / environmental science issues: endangered species, sustainable fisheries, pollution, and global warming to name a few. An in-depth study of macro-invertebrates will show evolutionary processes in species, and their ability to adapt to changing environmental conditions. In a continuation of the fall and spring terms, students will also be able to participate in a Service Learning component by being active volunteers in the macro-invertebrate study for the Upper Merrimack River Program. This group of volunteers sorts and records the “summer” data that was collected at thirteen different sites along the Merrimack River. From this report, an assessment of the water quality in the Merrimack River watershed is made for the Department of Environmental Services (DES) NH.

Full Year Course Description: Limnology and Marine Biology Course Description

This course is intended to provide laboratory and field experience through active investigation into the principles of ecology. The course is focused on aquatic and marine systems, built on an understanding of ecological concepts and issues in environmental science. Understanding of the tools, methods, and approaches of the ecologist will be developed through an emphasis on field studies at selected areas within our local ecosystems. We will investigate aspects of the aquatic and marine ecosystem including both abiotic (soil, water quality etc.) and biotic (flora, fauna). These ecological surveys will include our own Turkey River Watershed, a part of the Merrimack River Watershed, and the Gulf of Maine. The latter will be studied as our “local” marine and estuarine habitat, and will be compared to the National Marine Sanctuary in Key Largo, Florida.