Today turned out to be a very cool day. I got to sleep in, then after getting up made my way over to the Marine Science Center. Once there I went to talk with the people at MARC about volunteering this weekend because the schedule hadn't been made yet.
Then I went to connect with Meagan, someone I'm helping out with research. I ended up working there for a couple of hours. I was looking at pictures of seal populations and numbering how many males, females, and pups were in each picture. I would enter the data into a spreadsheet and make note of things like: how many pups were with females, how many pups were without females, were there any dead pups, any harems(males and females together), was there any mating taking place, any pups nursing. Then I would have to mark that each seal was entered into the data sheet by putting a ^ next each on the picture. It was fun and I'll be doing more of that in coming weeks.
When 2:30 rolled around today I made by way back to the MSC for my first time working at MARC. (I was suppose to work there this past semester, but I had an afternoon shift that was always cancelled because the center was really slow.) Anyways, today I learned how to make the food trays for the 3 Harbor seal pups that we have in (there pupping season just started, so are starting to get them in). Then one of the workers showed me how to restrain the seal, so we are able to tube feed the pups. Tube feeding is required because the pups haven't learned how to feed on fish yet. Hence, we stick a tube down their throat [gently] and put formula into their stomachs. After seeing how to restrain the pups, I got to do it for the other two pups. The first time was a bit of a struggle. Her flippers kept coming out from under me, but eventually I got it restrained. The second one didn't take as long, but he did wiggle a LOT more. :D It was lots of fun and I get to work there all of Wednesday, Thursday afternoon, and Friday afternoon. Yippee!
"That's All Folks!"
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