Right now the leaves are beginning to change in Seattle and it’s probably snowing in Hanover.

Fall in San Diego feels like: sandals and bare arms for sunset happy hour at a rooftop bar downtown, walking a few blocks to a a photography exhibit about environmental activism, and walking back to my car at night.  No jacket, enjoying the night air.

When I moved here, I made a list of Things To Do in San Diego (part of my TTD series; I also have volumes for Seattle, Manhattan, and D.C.).  High on that list: trying stand-up paddling, or paddleboarding.

People keep finding new ways to enjoy and explore the ocean.  Stand-up paddling is one of the newest trends (thanks, Laird Hamilton).  Think: large, buoyant surfboard + long paddle + trying to not fall over.  For those of us who don’t surf 30′ waves, it looks like this:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tk_five_0/

Had a great lesson at the Mission Bay Aquatic Center and am now ready to take out a paddleboard by myself and meander around the bay.

Stand-up paddling is a mellow way to be on the water.  We paddled past a sea lion who, drifting in the water, looked about as relaxed as we were.  We saw numerous cormorants and pelicans diving for their breakfasts.  As I was learning how to turn and steer the board, I almost paddled directly into a seagull resting on a channel buoy (the gull did not seem to be concerned).  We took our time in the shallows, peering down into the water to find stingrays hiding in the eelgrass.  I like stand-up paddling because it lets me get close to the environment in a slow, quiet, unobtrusive manner.

Stand-up paddling : surfing :: nordic skiing : downhill skiing (…and guess which type of skiing I prefer!).

I’m trying to take (and post) one photo each day for the month of October, but so far it’s been closer to one photo every 3 days.  This is just a fun game to help me discover my new home and to see how much I really like photography.  I’ve had my eye on a starter digital SLR camera for a little while, and I want to make sure it’s worth the investment (serious $$ for a grad student!).

Plus, most of my friends and family are far away.  This helps me share my life a little more.

Two photos for a lazy Sunday, Oct 11: cormorants at La Jolla Cove and afternoon gelato (chocolate hazelnut and pumpkin double scoop).

The work is difficult, but fluid dynamics goes down easier when you have a good study group and an oceanfront view:

My brain hurts.

I’m about 2 weeks into my PhD at Scripps.  Physical Oceanography was particularly challenging today; the most useful thing that I learned was how much I don’t know.  But I have to start somewhere, right?

As a mental break and reward for my hard work, I cooked mushroom-zucchini risotto tonight.  Risotto, unlike my fluid dynamics class, is very simple and slow-paced.

After a busy summer of 9-5 class every day (gasp! it’s almost like a real job!), I’ve had a few weeks for vacation, visiting family on the east coast, and hanging out in San Diego.  I’m really enjoying being a tourist in my own town.  San Diego feels a bit like a permanent vacation land, and it’s nice to partake in the relaxing and exploring before I resume grad student life tomorrow.

I spent the afternoon at Balboa Park yesterday, wandering the trails, watching the people, reading, relaxing with my feet up, and lounging in the sunny grass.  Add to these photos: temperature in the mid-80’s, a light breeze, and a live saxophone serenade of “Summertime, and the Living is Easy.”  Yes, it is.

One of the most fundamental tenets of science is objectivity: scientists analyze information based on facts alone, not on their personal opinions.  Over and over, I reminded my students at The Island School not to say that they “wanted to see” an increase in Nassau grouper density or that they “were disappointed” that species diversity decreased over time,” because scientsts aren’t supposed to care what the results are.  We perform unbiased experiments and then explain what we learn.

And then, at a 2008 lecture at the University of Washington, Dee Boersma (penguin biologist extraordinaire) opened her talk by saying that she is a conservation biologist because conservation biology is ecology that is based on values.

WHAT?? My mind was blown.

You mean, I can be an ecologist and have feelings?  There is a field that let’s me do rigorous scientific research and actually care about my results?  I’m sold.

We talked about this last week during a 3-day crash course in environmental ethics.  There was some initial resistance, because many scientists are trained so well in thinking that if we introduce subjectivity into our research, then we will lose all credibility as scientists.  But my colleague Ben pointed out that there is an important difference between value-driven goals and an objective analytical process: maybe my reason for doing a particular research project is driven by my desire to conserve coral reefs, but I can still be objective in my methodology.

Our visiting professor from Lewis and Clark, Jay Odenbaugh, used the analogy of a medical doctor to explain how some conservation biologists incorporate values into their work.  We want a doctor who wants her patients to get healthy, but we also want a doctor who can perform medical tests with objective scientific scrutiny.  In conservation biology lingo, this translates to: I can care about whether or not a coral reef ecosystem is in good shape, but I need to measure ecological parameters objectively.

Aldo Leopold, famed ecologist, uses a similar analogy:

“One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds… An ecologist must either harden his shell and make believe that the consequences of science are none of his business, or he must be the doctor who sees the marks of death in a community that believes itself well and does not want to be told otherwise.”

So this is what I do.  I am a scientist.  I study coral reefs, and I care a lot about them, too.

Sea turtle, resting on a lovely, health bed of corals at Apo Island (note the values in this statement)

During class this week, I sketched a little flowchart of how climate change is affecting the oceans.  I’m a visual thinker, and this helps me understand the various impacts that increased levels of atmospheric CO2 will have on the planet.

“More CO2″ is in a big black box on the left, because that is what’s driving all of these changes.  The two main problems with increasd CO2 are:

1. ocean acidification (seawater gets more acidic)
2. the greenhouse effect (Earth gets warmer)

Each of the connecting arrows denotes a cause and effect relationship and is supported by lots of ongoing scientific research.  On the right side of the chart, the italicized bits are outcomes that will affect our quality of life, though the magnitude of each effect will be different around the world (mostly, the impacts will be worse in places where people are already struggling).

I can further explain any of the components if you’d like, but basically: it doesn’t look good for fish or for people.

Hello, job security for a coral reef scientist?  Uh-oh.

It’s an unspoken rule among marine biologists that you must eat your study subject at least once.

This weekend my class spent a day at sea on a research vessel to gain experience with marine biology and oceanography research techniques.  We deployed several different types of sampling gear to collect organisms of various sizes at the surface, mid-water (~200 m) and seafloor (~500m).  The bottom trawl brought up all kinds of amazing deep sea creatures, like vampire fish with huge teeth, bioluminescent lures to attract prey, and special cells on their bellies that produce light so they don’t cast shadows and can hide from predators below.

The bottom trawl also brought up about a dozen jumbo prawns, which I generously offered to bring home and eat for dinner.  They were delicious – but what isn’t delicious with lots of butter and garlic?

Today is officially World Oceans Day.   The purpose is to “celebrate your connection to the ocean.”  I think the idea is that if people feel a closer personal connection to the ocean, we’re more likely to care about protecting it.  Some nice ideas: go sailing or boating or fishing, take a walk on the beach,* splurge on the wild Alaska salmon, stop fertilizing your lawn, don’t buy shrimp.

I celebrated by: turning in my Master’s thesis on community-based marine conservation in small-scale developing nations.  This is my ocean connection, for now at least.  Not bad, eh?

*or take a walk along any bay, river, or storm drain, because it’s all connected.