JULY 2022

Holland's Blog

Holland Conwell, undergraduate student

1 July 2022

As I’m writing this, it’s a sunny day with a view of the bay, and I’m currently reveling in this summer weather! I’ve also been enjoying the shift from finals to a more relaxed summer schedule where I can work on my research full-time. Being able to dedicate much more time to my projects and meet other student researchers in the Summer Undergraduate Research Program has been a welcome change!

Beyond that, I now have a wonderful team of summer research assistants for the Log Pond project! Kyra and I led some group orientations, and now they’re out in the field observing. I’ve enjoyed reconnecting with the Log Pond project, settling into my new role, and thinking about my upcoming independent project. Kyra let me know that the last of the log booms seems to have been removed from the log pond, which makes me think we might see a dip in hauled-out seals this year. Going forward, I’d like to compare past haul-out numbers with future numbers and see what might be going on there.

I also dove headfirst into diet analysis and have been in the midst of troubleshooting a PERMANOVA. Zoë drew up an excellent outline that guided me through some aspects that I found confusing in setting it up. I’ve definitely been grateful for that as I’ve started my analysis. After setting up my spreadsheets and getting them into RStudio, I tested for dispersion and found heterogeneous dispersion. Because of this, I followed steps in Schwarz et al., 2018 and averaged order proportions for each experimental group, creating columns for combined variables. After plugging all variables back into R, I found that I could conduct a PERMANOVA on sex, season+sex, and year+sex. The PERMANOVAs showed that season+sex and year+sex were significant, and from there, I attempted to depict these in an NMDS plot. I definitely need some confirmation on the validity of this process and some guidance on what to do next, but I’m excited about the progress I’ve been making! In the meantime, I’ll continue fine-tuning this process, reading up on statistical methods, and hopefully I’ll have some results soon!

Kyra's Blog

Kyra Bankhead, undergraduate student

1 July 2022

I am sad to say that this will be my last blog for the Marine Mammal Ecology Lab. I’ve made so many lifelong friends in this lab and will be using the knowledge and skills I gained for the rest of my scientific career. Grace has put in so much work for the data analysis of my research and I want to make sure she knows how much I highly value all her help. I also can’t thank Kate, Kathleen and Zoe enough for their friendship that got me through the many struggles of research and school. Finally, Alejandro has not only advised me on how to excel in my undergraduate studies, but has shaped me into the scientist that was able to get into grad school! I have so much appreciation for his mentorship. So I guess my love for this lab will be staying with me forever!

With the sadness following my departure from Bellingham comes excitement for starting my graduate career at OSU. I just sent off my data format to the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program to gauge the accessibility of data needed to analyze the spreading dynamics of begging behavior in common bottlenose dolphins. I’ve already finished my proposal for this research and of course used the knowledge I gained from this lab to get started in graduate school.

I will cherish all the wonderful memories in this lab for the rest of my life!

Signing off,
Kyra Bankhead

Kathleen's Blog

Kathleen McKeegan, graduate student

1 July 2022

Spring quarter is over and I’m nearing the end of my graduate career. This past month, I focused primarily on three things: celebrating all of our undergraduates who helped us in 2021-2022, moving labs, and finishing up my thesis. To celebrate our undergraduate research assistants, Zoë, Kate, Kyra, and I put together a little party for everyone, which was a lot of fun! It was great to hang out with everyone in an informal setting and just have a good time. I’m incredibly grateful for the friendships and the connections I’ve made over the past two years. We had an amazing team of undergrads, and I am forever indebted to all of them for their hard work and dedication to our project.

The second thing that happened this past month was that we moved labs! Alejandro’s lab is now right next to Dietmar’s lab and THERE’S A WINDOW! The moving process took a while and involved a lot of frozen scats and stinky freezers. But everything is all set up in the new lab and it has been a great workspace this summer. I hope the next graduate students and undergraduate research assistants like the new space!

Lastly, I have been focusing on finishing up my thesis. I officially scheduled my pre-defense and defense dates with my committee. I will be presenting and defending my thesis on July 27th, 2022. My completed thesis is due to my committee tomorrow (AHHHH), July 1st. I am looking forward to getting feedback from my committee during the predefense. This will be the first time that Dr. Austen Thomas and Dr. Matt Zinkgraf see my thesis in full, which is exciting but very nerve-racking. I am proud of the work I have done so far, and I know the feedback from Matt, Austen, and Alejandro will help push it to the next level.

By my next blog post, I will have tabled and defended my thesis and should be a few weeks away from graduating (hopefully, fingers crossed, don’t jinx it). I hope I have good news to report next time. But even if I don’t and I have to stick around for another quarter, it is all part of the scientific process and I know I will eventually have a thesis and a manuscript that is ready to be shared with the scientific community. Till next time!

Zoë's Blog

Zoë Lewis, graduate student

1 July 2022

Its July already? Wasn’t it just the beginning of graduate school?

Time flies when you are having fun…. Or have a lot of work to do on your masters thesis.

A few big changes have happened in the past few weeks. After delays in biomass modeling meetings and lots of work to be done on my first chapter regarding the foraging ecology of Steller sea lions using molecular techniques, my ever-patient committee has agreed to let me finish up my thesis with only my first chapter. This will allow me the time necessary to clean up my writing, build a more cohesive narrative, and really strengthen my analyses. Although I am a bit disappointed that my second chapter won’t be out in time for the thesis, I’m proud of all the work it has taken to get here, and very thankful for the understanding of my committee at the sheer size of the project, and the many additions to data analysis work along the way!

Among everything else, I made a quick trip out to Neah Bay to help with the Makah Fisheries Management interns and attempt to collect some scat. It was also a great opportunity to talk to Adrianne and Jon about my research, and stay up way to late discussing metabarcoding, foraging ecology and statistics. It was another great trip, and I returned to Bellingham tired, but fully motivated to finish up this thesis in the next few days.

So, for now I’ve been focusing on writing, and readjusting my thesis with these changes, and I’ve set my thesis defense date for July 22nd! As Dietmar has warned me on many occasions, I’m trying not to go down too many rabbit holes…

Looks like I am following the trend set by many graduate students before me of having my shortest blog in the month before defending.

Kate's Blog

Kate Clayton, undergraduate student

1 July 2022

I am so grateful that everyone made it through finals and to summer break! It is a relief to have some time off to rest and recover.

Before we left for break, the lab managers (Kathleen, Victoria, Bri, and I) put together an intro meeting with our new team. Everything went great and we are excited to get to work with everyone in the fall! It was also great to meet Victoria in person!

Some of our lab managers and students helped Alejandro move to our new lab during finals week. It went faster than we expected since we had so many hands helping out! Our new lab looks so inviting, especially since we have a window now, woohoo! I am looking forward to spending time in there once school starts back up.

I have spent the rest of my June back home in Idaho. It has been nice getting to spend time with family and not have to worry about overwhelming school stresses. But I am definitely missing the seal lab team! I am hoping to come back up and visit sometime soon.

Until next time,
Kate