December 2000: Pam Rogers, Editor
Annual All-HMSC Holiday Feast
Mark your calendars for noon, Tuesday, December 12, for the annual HMSC Holiday Feast and get-together. This year, due to expanding population, we will be having the feast in the Visitor Center in the Pattern Garden. You and your spouse/significant other are cordially invited to attend. The sign-up sheets will be in the mailroom, EPA, ODFW, Ship Support, NOAA, NMFS/NW and AK, and USFWS. Please let us know what dish you will be bringing and the number of guests.
We will feature Dr. Weber's BBQ tuna and roast ham, and beverages will be provided. Bring your decadent, delicious contributions, enjoy meeting some new HMSC people, and get a close-up look at the Visitor Center's new displays.
Bookstore Party
Bookstore Christmas Party and Sale for the Staff and Volunteers Wednesday, December 6 from 4:00 to 7:00 pm HMSC Visitor Center Family and friends welcome Receive 20% off in every department and even greater savings on selected items. We will be serving Punch and Hot Spiced Cider Homemade delicacies made by our Volunteer Staff
The Pressure Keeps Up on Physical Plant Wonder Workers
Randy Walker, Physical Plant Manager, can look back with satisfaction on the accomplishments of this past year. Some of the major projects the physical plant staff have tackled either directly, or through supervising contractors, have been: building a new deck for the Guin House (see photo), overseeing the new roofing put on the Bunkhouse, the Li House and the Dining Hall, dividing the Old Library into three rooms (see related article), redoing all the lab and outdoor trench covers from wood to metal, mowing down large swaths of Scotch broom around the Center, and remodeling a number of different labs and offices.
However, Bob Miller, Dave Johnson, Tom Matteson and Randy Walker cannot rest on their laurels. In addition to what the normal maintenance schedule demands, Randy has the following projects lined up to do:
New Computer Laboratory at Hatfield
The computer laboratory in the old library is complete and tables and computers are currently being installed. The lab is equipped with 16 iMac computers, wired for the internet. A permanent projector will be installed. The lab will be used in several different ways. It will support the marine education programs for teachers held at the Center. Two major programs for teachers that are offered through the Sea Grant program, COASTNET and RIVERNET, require the use of web sites to enter water quality data. Project GLOBE, an international program for which HMSC is a training site, requires extensive use of the GLOBE web site for data entry and communication between GLOBE schools and GLOBE scientists. Other teacher workshops and graduate courses will be expanded to include the use of Powerpoint, and the many resources of the web that support classroom instruction.
The lab will also be used to offer computer training to HMSC staff. Coming soon will be HTML and posting web sites, and classes on the use of Excel, Powerpoint and Word.
Month of the Whale
December will be the "Month of the Whale" in the HMSC Visitor Center. As the winter migration of the gray whales begins, the Visitor Center will offer some special activities about whales.
Bruce Mate will help train the Whale Watch Spoken Here volunteers in the Hennings Auditorium on December 2 and 3. On December 13, Robin Brown, ODFW will give a talk on "Seals and Sea Lions in Oregon: Research and Management".
Throughout the month, Bill Hanshumaker and Visitor Center volunteers will articulate a sea lion skeleton in the Resource Room.
During the official Whale Watch Week, December 26-January 1, the Visitor Center will be open 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. each day. At 1:30 daily a story teller will share stories about whales and other marine mammals. At 2:30 visitors are invited to an hour-long, hands-on laboratory, featuring whale "biofacts" such as skulls, teeth, baleen, pelts, skeletons.
Visitor Center displays, hands-on exhibits will include preserved whale barnacles, microscopic examination of krill and whale lice, tactile models of whales, a historic harpoon head, Argos and Discovery tags. Videos on whales and other marine mammals will be shown all day in the Auditorium.
Wednesday, December 13 7:00 p.m. HMSC Hennings Auditorium "Seals and Sea Lions in Oregon: Research and Management" Robin Brown, Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife
A review of the status (natural history, abundance, distribution and trends) of seals and sea lion populations in Oregon. An update on the federal marine Mammal Protection act of 1972 (as amended in 1994) that governs protection and management of marine mammals in Oregon and the U.S. An overview of the studies ODFW has conducted on pinniped populations, food habits, and interactions with fishery resources, including Columbia River sea lion capture/marking project, sea lion predation on salmonids at Willamette Falls, Rogue River and Alsea River.
Mara Spencer Defends Master's Thesis
On November 17, Mara Spencer defended her Master's Thesis on "behavioral and physiological indicators of stress in sablefish." She has been working with the National Marine Fisheries Alaska Fisheries Science Center, Fisheries Behavioral Ecology Group since 1991.
The development of assays for stress in marine fishes is vital for studying the impacts of bycatch in fisheries and for determining the health of fish being cultured or used in research. Her research developed behavioral and physiological assays for stress in juvenile sablefish, Anoplopoma fimbria, a species that comprises a valuable North Pacific fishery and is often a substantial part of incidental discard. The effects of conditions, intrinsic or extrinsic to the fish, on the variability of the stress response were also investigated.
The behavioral assays included activity levels, swimming speed at capture, and appetitive behavioral patterns in response to a chemical food stimulus (squid extract) and to a visual food stimulus (squid without odor). All of these behaviors were sensitive to stress. The physiological assays included plasma concentrations of cortisol, glucose, and lactate, all of which proved to be sensitive measures of stress in sablefish.
The results indicated that behavioral and physiological assays are sensitive indicators of stress in sablefish, although the magnitude, time courses, and correlation of responses may be affected by factors intrinsic and extrinsic to the fish that may vary before and during recovery. There was a correspondence between behavioral and physiological indications of stress shortly after the stress had been removed and levels of stress were still severe. However, there was a temporal discrepancy after partial recovery had occurred, at which time recovery of physiological norms had not yet been established although behavioral responses had recovered. While behavioral patterns may readjust quickly, the persistence of an energetic load during recovery from stress, as indicated by continued physiological perturbations, may compromise ability to respond to additional stress.
Library News
Training Session on Electronic Indexes
Wednesday, December 6th at 1 and Monday December 11th at 11, I will give
tips on using some of the electronic indexes. I'll cover searching basics
as needed as well as advanced options and how to get the item once you find
the citation. We'll focus on Aquatic Sciences and Fisheries Abstracts, but
will cover others as requested. Bring a topic you want to search. This can
be a subject, an author, or a specific article. We'll meet by my office and
then go to the computers to work.
Library Books Renewal Time
All people who have six month checkout on your library material may renew
items due December 15th now. You can do this on the web by going to
http://oasis.orst.edu/patroninfo and typing in your name and social security
number. A list of items that are checked out to you will appear. Check the
ones that need to be renewed (due December 15) and then click on "Renew
Selected Items." The new due date will be June 15, 2001.
If you cannot renew an item, it probably means you have reached the limit on
renewals and need to return it. In this case, either return it or ask the
Library Staff for assistance. Let me know if you have any problems.
Science Online, But not Nature
The OSU Libraries now provide online access to Science Magazine and Science
Now for those using on the OSU network.. The URL to access Science Magazine
is: http://www.sciencemag.org/ The URL to access Science Now is:
http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/ Science Now is also accessible from the
Science Magazine home page via hotlink. You can also get to them via Oasis
by searching the journal title and clicking on the hotlink.
After careful consideration, we have decided not to subscribe to Nature
online. It was too expensive; Nature charges a premium for electronic access
rather the negotiating a reduced price. It is unclear on the limitations of
access; is it open to the all on the OSU network, or only selected physical
locations, i.e.. the Valley Library. While all material is included in the
electronic version, the 12-issue delay of this access is unacceptable.
Finally, Nature does not guarantee permanent access to the electronic files,
and does not give permission to archive them locally. We will continue to
review these conditions and hope they will change over time so we can
provide a site license to the complete contents of Nature. You can get into
the abstracts and news items.
For a complete list of the electronic journals provided through the OSU
Libraries, check out this web site.
http://osulibrary.orst.edu/research/ejournal.htm
New Exhibit in the Library
Just in time for the holidays, the new exhibit highlights a variety of
children's science books. A good children's science book is accurate,
interesting, well-written, and well-designed. Many of those on display are
available in the HMSC Bookstore.
Personnel Notes
Former researcher Mike Behrenfeld came back to visit the HMSC and presented a seminar on "modeling photosynthesis in the ocean." Mike is now with the Goddard Space Laboratories in Washington, D.C. He has been participating in some of the most important projects that have ever been done in oceanography and has made basic contributions and greatly simplified the methods for estimating photosynthesis in the sea. His research bears directly on efforts to understand global carbon cycles and global climate change.