Training A New Generation of Marine Scientists

Today, Kim's diversity of fishes class took to the seas to evaluate fish diversity in the Mississippi Sound and around our barrier islands. We brought almost 30 students onto the R/V Jim Franks, where we conducted two ten-minute trawls and then headed to the barrier islands for eight seine tows. The students also collected vertical water quality profiles on the ship and surface measurements on the beach to help characterize differences at the sampling locations. This was our first time using the new water quality sensor, as Kim and a team of USM faculty were awarded a grant to purchase a water quality sensor for use with undergraduate students. What's cool about this new water quality sensor is that researchers can deploy this sensor into the field, let it collect data, and then retrieve it up to 90 days later. Unlike our handheld water quality sensor, this one has internal data logging features and GPS, making it a great addition to support undergraduate classes and longer term evaluations of water quality around coastal Mississippi.

The highlights of our fishing efforts today were a good-sized adult hardhead catfish, a mid-stage juvenile and an even younger juvenile blue crab, an Atlantic brief squid, a great jellyfish that I couldn't snap a picture of in time, and lots of mullet. Mullet were jumping out of the water all around us while we fished at the barrier islands. The students will be compiling their data and then completing data analyses to understand the effects of different sampling techniques, sampling gear, and locations on the fish communities. While this is only the second time I've been present for this sampling trip, I know that the communities were quite different this time from the communities we sampled two years ago. I look forward to seeing how these communities change, or stay the same, in future iterations of this class.

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