Underwater in Antarctica

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!

I am still adjusting to diving under ice here, but I am getting better and better at diving each day. This is good because we are diving pretty much every day now! Right now we are diving on a spot called Dayton's Plateau. We go through a hole of 10 ft. thick ice (some of the ice is over 20 ft. thick, so this is "thin" ice). Then we head to the bottom at about 60 ft. and swim over to a wall. All along this wall from 60-200 ft. are cages that Paul Dayton put out in the 60s and 70s to exclude predators from eating sponges. He didn't get good results from the predator experiment because ecological processes happen too slowly in this cold water. ut the cages acted like open bottom space and Paul is now studying what species grew on the cages through the decades. The divers can't go to the deeper cages now which is why the team has SCINI (the cool ROV). So SCINI does the dep stuff and the divers go to the cages that are above 130 ft., take photos of the cages, collect interesting species that might not be described yet, and bring it all back to smiling Paul. I don't know of anyone who smiles more than Paul. It is a delight to work for him and bring him treasures (sponges and bryozoans) that make him happy.

See the cage?

Our hole from under the ice

Jennifer looks up at the hole (is there a diver in there or a seal??)

This was grabbed from a video - so it isn't super clear. But you can get an idea of how clear the water is. I've never seen anything like it. It really is like flying through air..... you could forget you were underwater with ease here.

OK marine bio nerds - this is COOL! This is a sponge that has been eaten and this is the remaining spicule skeleton. The sea stars that ate the sponge are still there scooping up the scraps. Yummy. Neat eh?

This is a huge volcano sponge with some anchor ice growing on it (look for long spiky ice)

There are more underwater photos here: http://picasaweb.google.com/111221596171793333099/AntarcticaUnderwater#

Hope everyone is doing well - I really miss Jay and my family and my cats...... but I am also happy to be here in a place I've dreamed of for so long......