HECATE STRAIT 2017
We've had a wonderful two dives this morning and afternoon and are very excited to share the first few photos. The sponges are gorgeous and so far our research is on schedule (knock on wood).Please contact before sharing photos.
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After a two day steam we arrived at the Hecate Strait sponge reefs and deployed the ROV for our first on-site dive. The goals were to get the hang of operating our instruments, deploy flow probes for calibration, and get sponge samples and mud cores for our on-board mesocosm experiment. This is the first time we’ve live streamed our dives and we’re very excited to be able to share our research with the country. Viewers had many questions about our operations and here are a select few:
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by Evgeni Matveev Why do we spend our time, energy, and taxpayer money to go to a remote part of Canada and study sea sponges? An important question, no doubt. Right off the coast of Canada are the largest and only known sponge reefs in the world; despite this there is very little known about this unique ecosystem. |
Because we know so little about such an enormous and long-lived structure it’s crucial that we assess the role of the reefs in the Canadian Pacific ecosystem and determine the risk human activity poses to their survival. Data collected by us could be used used in the future for environmental policy design. |
Video transects will then be analysed to get a measure of biodiversity, and compared to the audio recordings. The idea is to determine whether hydrophones are a viable option for quantifying the number of animals that live on and off reef. Eventually this will allow us to assess to what animals are living on the reef even when we can't be there with the ROV. |
This year Sally Leys and Evgeni Matveev are interested in confirming these results by looking at the relationship of sponge pumping rate and oxygen consumption with surrounding flow. It could be that these sponges are so abundant in this area because tidal cycles along the continental shelf provide enough surrounding flow for the sponges to survive on little food. |
SIP Room |
The Leys lab has been exploring the sponge reefs off the coast of British Columbia. Using the Remotely Operated Vehicle ROPOS our team has been studying the ecology, physiology and behaviour of sponges in the newest Marine Protected Area in Canada.
Check in with us on our LIVE Stream!