From Parker Levinson, MS Student and 2022 Field Crew Leader:
The start of the season always flies by, perhaps because the transition to working in the dry and cold Antarctic climate can be a bit tiring. Despite this being my fourth season on the Ice, I forget how draining it is to simply adjust to life down here. Additionally, there are a lot of logistics that need to happen before we can start working in the field, which results in running lots of "errands" around McMurdo Station from swapping out a snowmobile helmet for the appropriate size to grabbing all of our equipment for the field.
John Hobgood snowmobiling with Mt. Erebus in the background on a very clear day.
Photo Credit: Parker Levinson
In a typical year, we would be living in a field camp out by Big Razorback, a seal colony located in the center of our study area about an hour snowmobile drive from McMurdo Station, so a lot of the first week on Station would be spent getting our camp outfitted and ready to be lived in. However, this year, the sea ice formed later than normal - around late August - so the ice hasn’t had time to get thick enough to support the heavy machinery required to drag out our living structures. Because of this, we will be based out of McMurdo Station for all of 2022. Although we were all looking forward to living and working in the field, we understand why we can't have a field camp this year and are excited to take advantage of the readily available showers and delicious baked goods that living in town (aka McMurdo Station) provide.
We finished our final training on Thursday - learning about how to maintain and uphold the Antarctic Treaty through environmental regulations - and were able to get out on the sea ice Friday. We each spent some time experimenting with different head layering systems to stay warm under our snowmobile helmets, and eventually, all figured out a good system.
Once we were layered up, we headed out to Turtle Rock where we found 5 pups! Turtle Rock is home to many of our local born mothers, and Friday was no exception. One mother was actually born at Turtle Rock back in 1998, making her 24 years old, and this was her 10th pup. It was quite nice to get out and see some seals; I had forgotten how cute the young pups are! Plus, the weather has been absolutely superb - sunny with very limited wind!
Big Razorback colony with a couple mom/pup pairs seen to the left of the island, Little Razorback colony
in the back, and Mt. Erebus looming large behind the islands. Photo Credit: Parker Levinson
This week, we also took a helicopter flight over the study area, looking for hazardous areas and seals hauled out in unusual places. It was really useful to see the area from above, and we'll continue to reference the photos we took as we plan out our season.
A newborn pup shows off its flippers before researchers tag it.
Photo Credit: Morgan Anderson, Under NMFS Permit No. 26375.
Now, as pupping steadily increases, we’re focused on getting trained up with seal handling and data entry.
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