Current Research Blogs
Ellie's Blog
Ellie Taylor, undergraduate student
1 January 2025
Hi Everyone,
Hope you are enjoying the holidays and have had a restful break!
After the busy whirlwind of finals week, this break has been a much-needed reset. I got to go to Leavenworth to do some snowmobiling and skiing, then headed home to Southern California to spend the holidays with my family.
Towards the end of fall, I was working with Dawson to learn the protocols he will be using in his study on Northern American River Otters. Now that things have slowed down, I have been able to read more literature on river otters and I am very hopeful that I can assist Dawson throughout his study and learn alongside him. Additionally, Rachel and I have been continuing to work through the Harbor Seal scat samples for Erin D’Agnes’s study. I still love getting to do extractions every week and this has been such a great opportunity for me to build confidence in the lab.
I am very excited for this next quarter in the log pond, as I have brought on some new research assistants, and I think they will be a great addition to our team. Although winter observations typically bring challenging weather and less seal presence, it is still important that we keep collecting data and I am hopeful that we keep our spirits high.
Wishing you all a Happy New Year!
Cheers,
Ellie
Rachel's Blog
Rachel Strober, undergraduate student
1 January 2025
Hello everyone!
I hope you all enjoyed the holidays! I have spent most of winter break back home on the Oregon Coast with my family, enjoying stormy beach days and the hikes I grew up exploring on. It was great to see my large extended family and play with my baby cousins as there seems to be more and more of them each year. It has also been nice to have some time to relax after a busy fall quarter and an especially busy finals week, but I am continuing to work on research for my sea lion project while I have more time over these few weeks. Additionally, I spent much of fall quarter researching locations and programs for study abroad, and have applied to a program in Galway, Ireland, for next fall! I am very excited and hopeful for this exchange program, and have been researching opportunities to become involved in marine mammal research there for a quarter.
Fall quarter at Whatcom Creek wrapped up with fewer and fewer harbor seal sightings as the chum run came to a close. As always, we will continue to have observations throughout the winter once classes begin and will try to get out there as much as the weather permits. Winter observations are notably less eventful as far as sightings go, but they are all the same important as year-round data is critical.
Congratulations to Emma and Davis for graduating this past quarter! We are very grateful for the time they put into the lab and I hope the best for them! As of now, we are not yet hiring for more lab assistants, but after assessing our numbers, we will start the process either at the end of winter quarter or end of spring quarter.
Happy 2025!
Rachel
Alexandrea's Blog
Alexandrea Otto, graduate student
1 January 2025
Hi and Happy New Year folks!
With the start of every year and journey around the sun, what an opportunity to take a minute to reflect and ring in the new year of Twenty Twenty-Five with good cheer and high spirits! I’ll be ringing in the new year in the midst of data analysis and writing still! Little by little, chipping away and focusing on both is all a part of the graduate studies process.
I send warm wishes to all this New Years Eve and hope many folks are able to spend these past days close with family and friends nearby. Three small rituals for New Years Eve include: Burning the Old Year Away, Drink to your Dreams, and Doorway Protection of salt or herbs to set the intention of keeping your space safe and filled with good energy in the new year!
I’ll be setting the good intentions and energy of finishing up my thesis here soon! Remember to stay well, take care of yourselves, and wishing nothing but good health for everyone out there!
Sailing Sea Lions,
Alex
Victoria's Blog
Victoria Vinecke, graduate student
1 January 2025
Hello everyone,
As for my research, I will be presenting my project at the WA – BC American Fisheries Society annual meeting in Vancouver, BC this March! Specifically, I will be presenting during the “Pinniped Interactions Symposium”. I am excited to attend a fisheries conference to absorb all the information that I can! I know my knowledge regarding ichthyology could be improved so I will be taking lots of notes!
Once back from Idaho, I plan on getting back into the lab to process the rest of the control samples collected while at the Vancouver Rehab Center. Once those are processed, I can run the rest of the sex determination qPCRs on the control and mixed samples! I am hopeful that will be the end of lab work and data collection! Then I will be able to move onto writing up my results!
Until next time,
Victoria
Zoe's Blog
Zoe Hosford, graduate student
1 January 2025
Hey everyone,
Happy New Year! I hope everyone has been enjoying their winter break, spending the holidays with the people they care about most. I have been enjoying my quality time in Maine the past 3 weeks, spending time with family and friends, and getting to explore my home state. I have also taken the time this break to do some fun personal reading that has been on my horizon for months, because we all know that doesn’t get done during the school year. This break has been exactly what I needed… though I am ready to escape the cold!
But with break quickly coming to a close, it’s time to get back to work. I have spent a lot of time working on finalizing my thesis research proposal, along with starting my application for some big grants to apply for in the New Year. I’m still waiting on data, but hopefully shortly after my return to Washington, I will have that to get the ball rolling on modeling and analysis.
Looking forward to getting back to campus soon and back to work!
Orcas & Seals,
Zoe
At Marshall Point Lighthouse – St. George, ME.
Luminaries on Christmas Eve – a family tradition! Photo by Z. Hosford.
Haley's Blog
Haley Recob, undergraduate student
1 January 2025
Happy New Year!
Fall quarter ended with difficult finals and eventful observations at Whatcom Creek. Fall quarter was one of my most challenging quarters yet at WWU and I am proud to say I finished strong. During winter break I traveled home to Sammamish for the holidays. It has been a restful break, spent with family and friends. Now, I am excited for Winter Quarter and to get back to Bellingham to see my lab mates and friends.
Before the quarter ended during the beginning of this month, many harbor seals and sea lions were still seen preying on salmon at Whatcom Creek. On my observations, I usually IDed harbor seal 0039 (or goggle) eating multiple salmon during an observation. Now that the salmon run is coming to a close, I expect to see less marine mammal activity in the following winter months.
Before winter break, for both the Whatcom Creek project and Maren and Is independent project, we have been working on a data management plan. Rachel and I transferred the Whatcom Creek project data into a new external hard drive and an online server. This way we can organize our data and have it readily available for those who manager the MMEL in years to come. In Maren and Is independent project, we are almost done condensing our salmon run abundance data. We are hoping to have it organized by the start of the quarter so we can start data analysis in January. Yay!
That's all for now,
Haley
Maren's Blog
Marem Duffy, undergraduate student
1 January 2025
Hello!
It has been really nice to relax after a crazy winter quarter. I have gotten the chance to spend a lot of time with family and get outside in the snow here in Alaska. We saw the aurora borealis and it was beautiful! I am looking forward to getting back to Bellingham to start a little more relaxed quarter with some interesting classes. Haley and I are finishing up our data organization on Washington and Canadian salmon run abundance and will be continuing with more data analysis and mapping when we get back to campus.
Until next time,
Maren
Dawson's Blog
Dawson Little, graduate student
1 January 2025
Hi y'all,
I hope everyone had happy holidays and a good winter break! After wrapping up my first quarter at Western, it was nice to take some time to decompress, reflect, and see my family in Virginia after a long time apart.
Earlier this month, I wrapped up classes and continued working with fellow lab members, Ellie and Chloe, on protocols for processing river otter scats. They are both great researchers, and I look forward to continuing to work with them as the project progresses. Before break, I ordered molecular primers/probes to determine river otter sex from scat samples which I'm planning on beginning once the next quarter starts up. I also completed the first full draft of my thesis proposal which was very exciting. While there was a lot of trial and error and rethinking of my project in this first quarter of my master's, it finally feels like things are starting to fall in place. I'm very grateful for the academic community I've found myself in and all that I've been able to learn in such a short time frame.
While the break has been refreshing, I'm looking forward to getting back into the nitty gritty of sample analysis and proposal writing as well as continuing my coursework. I'm also very excited as this will be the first quarter where I will be available to attend lab meetings and get to know folks in the lab a bit more. Hope everyone had a happy new year!
Best,
Dawson