Deadliest Catch for Dummies: Part 1
Today my research partner and I had our first day of field work for our project, and like many research projects, nothing went as planned. We headed out on the motorboat at slack tide this morning and whizzed across to Shaw Island. After a crash course in basic fishing technique (both of us have zero fishing experience) we settled down for what we thought would be a successful morning of catching, tagging, and performing gastric lavage on Quillback and Copper Rockfish. We had several moments of excitement when we thought there was a bite…it turned out that both of us were just really talented at hooking rocks on the channel floor. Rocks, but no Rockfish. We did spot several seals, which for me was really exciting as the only one I’ve seen so far was mutilated and half decomposed on the beach. So, we headed back disappointed and after a talk with our mentor, decided that as he has had bad luck for the past couple weeks with hooking any fish, it would be safest if we switched to a new project.
That’s where the Deadliest Catch part comes in. Our project is to catch and identify crabs of the rocky intertidal and subtidal areas and make measurements of the dentition on their claws. Specifically the aspect ratio, radius of curvature and wear patterns. First step: buy chicken legs for the crab pot bait. Second step: head back out on the water!
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