We spent the morning catching up with data coding and I managed to produce some maps. An interesting one that got folks interested was a very simple map of where we saw gannets feeding or searching for food. They were pretty much all feeding on the edge of the Jones Bank, as predicted, and in the area where there were the strongest internal waves. You're going to have to visit Clare Embling's blog for an explanation of what internal waves are, but the turbulence that causes these seems to be the key thing that makes these places such productive places for marine organisms and drive food nearer to the surface where seabirds can find it.
The rest of the day was spent collecting water samples and preparing for one of the big experiments - a seemingly innocuous release of dye. But this is no ordinary dye, it's £10,000 ofpotent pink pigment. In this photo, they are preparing the hose that will pump the dye and release it at a depth of about 5o metres. We will then spend the next day or so, circling around it with special sensors to discover how it drifts through the water column and is mixed up by the turbulence generated from the bank.
I got fed up with sitting down all day and am getting concerned by the amount of good food I'm eating, so decided to try out the gym. It's a bit off-putting that you're trying to use things like a rowing machine and an exercise bike on a rolling ship. It was later that Mark pointed out to me that all of these machines involve sitting down. So no change then.
We managed to put in a couple of hours of line transecting this evening. We saw a few gannets feeding, but didn't see any Cory's shearwaters.
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