For those of you who are wondering, or thinking about a bit of science communication, you might be a bit curious about this blog. Possibly why it was done and how, and also maybe a little bit of my own thoughts about the process.

For starters it wasn’t easy. I’m here (in Svalbard) as a student to be studying, blogging isn’t part of the remit. As you may have gathered we were working late on the ship, sometimes 16 hour days. So to fit this in I generally woke up about 45 minutes earlier than my colleagues to write this out the morning after. Occasionally I got a little bit of time during the day to process some photos. I took about 150 photos a day which on average was about 146 photos/day more than everyone else.

Why did I do it? Why did I forgo lovely sleep? Because I think this is important. The chance that someone reading this might learn something new, might have a slightly greater respect for and understanding of science. That a kid might be inspired to go out and find something new or that a parent will want their child to grow up and be an explorer in this day and age where is seems everything is known and understood. I still remember one of my friends, we were 15, telling me that science was boring now, it was exciting 100 years ago when there were new inventions and such, but why do it now? There isn’t anything new to find. I’ve been told a lot of incorrect things in my life, but that sits right up near the top. There are new things found every day, new experiences, new systems to understand. It’s not just small critters that live at the bottom of the sea, but how these things all fit together. There are billions of things yet to find out, and we shouldn’t think all the cool stuff has been invented. (I’d also like to note that since then smart phones have become ubiquitous, the iPod is everywhere, my camera has a touch screen and we have satellite internet on ships below 80 degrees, technology hasn’t stopped).

So in part it’s inspiration and the wonder of science. But as a scientist this has also been a really really good revision tool. I’m going to have to memorise the names of all the creatures you’ve seen here. I’ll have to describe interactions and collection methods, all kinds of things. By having done this blog I’ve reflected as I’ve gone, I’ve got really detailed notes, and by having to explain things to other people I’ve developed a better understanding of the things I’m studying.

Whilst this isn’t for everyone, and most people can’t write as fast as I can (if it was more time consuming it would be a lot harder) personally I’d recommend the experience to everyone. Don’t let awesome things get lost because you were tired when you learnt them, because you wanted to watch TV rather than fill in your diary or worst, because you don’t think people would be interested in science.

Of course now the challenge is finding the next thing. 

So, since being trained on how to shoot things and jump into cold water without dying, very little of photogenic value has happened. 
Instead what has happened is a bunch of lectures on various topics relating to the nature of the Arctic environment, the interactions between the water column (pelagic) and the sea floor (benthic) and then some super duper in depth discussions about the critters that live in the benthos and how they work. So, whilst it has been incredibly interesting and astonishingly educational it isn't so easy to write about because a bunch of kids taking notes in lectures.. well there's nothing new to that. 
So instead I'm going to share a few of the things we learnt, and random points I thought were interesting. 

Firstly we won't be seeing sea ice whilst we are here in Svalbard because of the Arctic sea ice retreat that you might have heard about. So that's a stark sign of global change. It's somewhat hard to deny that things are changing whilst up here, it's pretty clear.

The Arctic and the Antarctic really aren't similar, aside from being cold with ice. The biology is different, the seasonality is different, the amounts and age of ice is different etc. etc. Plus the Arctic has fjords, polar bears and no penguins, though it does have this thing that looks like a penguin (but it isn't!)

The water movements within the Arctic area are hugely complex. Water is coming in from the North Atlantic Current (which is warm and salty), then the Bering Strait brings in some cold fresher water and all these currents interact and swirl around in various patterns resulting in significant ecological differences in very small areas. 

Some of the deep water in the Arctic can sit around for 300 years, whilst other shallower more fast moving water can be in and out in 10 years. I still find the idea of identifying water as "Atlantic" or "Tasman" etc. as a somewhat odd concept, surely water isn't so easily described, but apparently it can be, and it's actually a really important part of oceanography.

I thought it was quite cool that the terminal moraine from a glacier at the end of a fjord, if sufficiently shallow, can act almost as a fjord dam limiting water circulation and therefore drastically changing that fjords ecology. Moraines are awesome.

There was a lot of general discussion about the importance of studying the marine environment and particularly the benthos.. seeing as this is a benthic ecology course that isn't overly surprising. But so far, I'd have to concur. There are some really importance processes happening at the bottom of the sea, including carbon cycling (ie. all I can gather from this article is that they know it's an important factor.. but really not much more than that). Plus, there are some super duper crazy animals living down there, and if these guys can't be an inspiration for some creativve biomimicry then I don't know what can. Anyhow, point is, its probably worth looking into. 

That said, it looks like the melt water from glaciers has a huge impact on fjord ecology too, bringing fresh nutrients, sediments and fresh water. So maybe it isn't just a pretty picture. 

Then we got into a little bit of Geography, which was fun. Stuff like the intermediate disturbance hypothesis and a little bit of island bio-geography. Not feeling too far from home now! 

There was a lot of discussion about the impacts of climate change and how they are going to change the ecology, and in some cases new species are already moving back into the Arctic because the environment has changed sufficiently. Overall, people are expecting a very different Arctic. A summer without sea ice will have a huge impact on the communities dependant on sea ice, not to mention on the communities dependant on the communities dependant on sea ice. And on it goes. There will be changes to the fisheries, to everything. The Arctic is at the fore of witnessing these changes, but it will only be time until similar changes are felt globally. When we won't find the species we used to find. It can be quite distressing hearing about the impacts of climate change, particularly on the big mammals that we tend to identify quite well with. Because of the lack of sea ice there are less areas for seals and walruses to raise their pups within reasonable distances from feeding grounds. (ie. imagine if all the supermarkets and cafes within your usual driving distance were removed and suddenly you had to drive twice as far, and then imagine it got worse next year, and the year after, not so bad if you live in the city, but for anyone already living on the edge.. well there's some expletives that can fit there. N.B a walrus CANNOT create it's own veggie garden as we can). 

So far no one has mentioned the giant squid, we can but hope.

The scientific world did tend to think that the deep sea was dull, boring, the same everywhere (homogeneous), dull, boring and more dull. That was until quite recently when they discovered those black smokers mentioned earlier. Then they started doing things like watching what happens to a dead whale ("Whale Fall") on a patch of apparently empty sea floor. And what happened was kinda cool, if rather macabre, and brought a whole new understanding to what's happening at the bottom of the sea whilst we're not looking. If a whale falls in the ocean and there's no one to hear it, does it make a noise? Yep, something along the lines of "THUD - nom nom nom nom nom". So much for Zen. 

Also, walruses are left tusked. Go science!

Next up, a bit of hard core biology for the geographer and preparation for a cruise. 

Its been less than 24 hours on Svalbard. So far I’ve navigated the shops and purchased some postcards. Whilst these activities are less than scientific they are vital life skills.

However, as they say in the burbs (suburbs for the non-natives out there), shit just got real. Today we have a safety course. What does this mean?

We had an hour or so lecture on the various ways you can die on the island (did I hear someone say Academia is an ivory tower..?). These ways include: avalanches, rock falls, falling into a crevasse (60% of Svalbard is Glaciers, that’s a lot of crevasses), getting a virus from mice (though that won’t kill you for 15 years), being bitten by a rabid fox or, as is traditional, mauled by polar bear. Then there’s the usual exposure issues, falling off boats etc.

The good news? No spiders, no snakes, no polar bears in town.

The “adventurous” news? Now we’re off to the range to learn how to shoot a high powered rifle at a bear.

I’d never seen a real gun before, never heard a gun shot let alone fired one of the bloody things. In that way I’m a fairly typical white bread aussie. I have, what I believe to be, a perfectly reasonable fear of guns. They are an astonishing way of extinguishing life with minimal human effort. That said, my natural pacifist tendencies when competing with the thought of a massively pissed polar bear.. well, survival wins out there. The day the bears learn how to load a gun we’re all 100% buggered.

However, in the name of science I, along with my colleagues, learnt from a wonderfully thorough Finnish fellow. We were taught gun basics, this is a trigger, this is a barrel etc. We learnt how to load and half load the guns. We were taught never to walk through town with a loaded gun. We were reminded that there’d be kick back and how to stand to maintain balance. Etc. etc. As introductions to a killing machine go, it was pretty friendly. I was also impressed with all the PI books I’ve read over the years. They were actually pretty helpful, particularly those written about people who were freaked out about shooting stuff. 

That said, the shock of hearing someone’s gun go off the first time.. bloody oath. 7 of us shooting at the one time made quite an impression. I have to say, I was pretty stoked with my first shots, though they went rapidly downhill from there due to excess adrenalin. As for shooting standing up.. I’m pretty sure I entirely missed the target on at least one occasion. 

Now, for all of you greenies out there, you’re probably a little worried. What are they doing teaching kiddies to shoot an endangered species for? Well, I’ll tell you.

Polar bears are deadly. They hunt and eat people. This is just how it is, Svalbard is their home and we barge in looking for coal, fish etc. So, in the first instance all effort is made to avoid bears entirely. This is done through knowledge of the bears, where they like to be at certain times of year etc. However, sometimes the bears surprise us. They’re curious creatures and like to have a wander too. For the most part the bears won’t be hunting people and if they are considered too close a flare gun is shot which scares off the bear. In most instances that works. It’s only in instances where the bear is actively hunting the people involved that there are issues. In this case, if the bear isn’t scared off by flares and loud noises and continues to approach, well then you might have to shoot. Believe you me, the description of an instance where a bear might have to be shot sent shivers down my spine. Let alone the thought of having to try and shoot a moving, rather angry/hungry creature who you know is endangered. That takes some guts. 

There have been two bear shootings this year on Svalbard. One was two skiiers and a dog out of town and in the other instance the bear was climbing into a hut (note, people were inside the hut).

For all people say Australia is a dangerous country, at least nothing is ever going to come barrelling into your tent to eat you. The worst that’s likely is a rather enthusiastic wombat, and even then.. unlikely.

So after the adrenalin and cold shivers brought on by bears, we headed back to uni to be kitted out with a cold water survival suit. The next thing that can kill you, and did kill a woman this year, falling into the water and dying of shock. Basically these suits are water proof, slightly lined, look like a giant caterpillar and will help you survive if a zodiac over turns.

This part of the day was pretty silly, nothing like climbing into a onsie to feel like a dag, and we got to float in the sea whilst gazing up at glaciers. It was awesome.

Tomorrow the real work starts. But let it never be said that I didn’t sing for my supper!