Dejeanne Doublet inspects a red oak in BiodiversiTree. (SERC)
by Kristen Minogue
We sprayed pig’s blood on baby trees, studied a strange ménage a trois in the orchid world and met the father of marine invasions science himself. It’s been an odd year at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center. But we like living in interesting times. Here are 10 of our favorite stories from 2014. Here’s hoping 2015 is even stranger.
by Heather Soulen, research technician
When I mention that we use “glue sticks” at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center to help answer research questions about wetland ecology, I get looks of confusion and amusement. People often think I am using:
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But, what I really mean is that I use these:
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by Michelle Marraffini, SERC marine biologist
SERC diver Lina Ceballos carries sampling equipment down to depth to survey species underwater.
(Michelle Marraffini/SERC)
by Kristen Minogue
Alewives, one of two species of River Herring in Chesapeake Bay. (Geoffrey Gilmour-Taylor)
It’s no secret that River Herring are in trouble. There was a time, back in the 1950s, when Maryland fishermen regularly pulled in 4 million pounds or more a year of the silver fish. Then something mysterious happened. Herring harvests generally fluctuate from year to year. But in the 1970s, they fell and never came back up. For the last four decades, commercial fishermen in Maryland have been lucky to catch a few hundred thousand a year. Now they catch none.
Bread, flour, cornmeal, rice and pasta. (Scott Bauer/USDA)
Food doesn’t typically get the spotlight in talks on climate change. Even when human health enters the picture, heat waves and category 5 hurricanes often dominate coverage. But as the Earth changes, so does agriculture. That raised just one of several questions scientists wrestled with at the Smithsonian’s second climate change symposium, titled “Living in the Anthropocene”: What will the world’s 7 billion people eat?
by Kristen Minogue
Menhaden fish kill in Narragansett Bay, Rhode Island. (Chris Deacutis)
Dead zones form in waters where oxygen plummets to levels too low for fish, crabs or other animals to survive. In deeper waters, dead zones may last for months, as with the annual summer dead zone in the Chesapeake Bay. Temporary dead zones may occur in shallow waters at night. The largest dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico and Baltic Sea can cover more than 20,000 square miles of the sea floor. The number of dead zones across the world is growing exponentially, doubling each decade since the 1960s.
“They’re having a big impact on life in the coastal zone worldwide,” said Keryn Gedan, a co-author and marine ecologist at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center and the University of Maryland. “A lot of people live on the coast, and they’re experiencing more fish kills and more harmful algal blooms. These are effects of dead zones that have an impact on our lives.”
Charles McC. Mathias Laboratory (Smithsonian Environmental Research Center)
by Kristen Minogue
On September 19, the doors officially opened inside what’s targeted to be the Smithsonian’s first LEED-Platinum building: the Charles McC. Mathias Laboratory at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center.
The vision for a more sustainable lab emerged in the 1990s. Six years ago, SERC director Tuck Hines shared the idea with the then-new Secretary of the Smithsonian, Wayne Clough, on his first visit to the SERC campus.
“Tuck’s enthusiasm was infectious, and I told him then and there, you have my full support. We have to get this done,” Clough said. “But back then, it was just a dream….Today, six years from that first discussion, we’re here today to say, the dream has been fulfilled.”
Jellyfish Chrysaora quinquecirrha (Lori Davias)
Every summer, the food web in Chesapeake Bay gets jostled around as two plankton-eating predators jockey for power: comb jellies and jellyfish. Most smaller species don’t have a stake in the battle—both predators eat zooplankton and fish eggs, after all. But for young oyster larvae, the victor could make the difference between being protected civilians or collateral damage.
by Kristen Minogue
Piscataway Indians lived on the Rhode River up to colonial times, though anthropologists believe they used the land for temporary campsites, not permanent settlements.
For more than 10,000 years, Native Americans hunted and fished in the Chesapeake. Broken pottery, village sites, burial grounds and other artifacts bear witness to their near-continuous presence around the Bay. But one type of artifact—ancient trash piles called shell middens—hasn’t received as much attention. And these tell another important story.
By Sarah Hansen
Tony Thomas (left), education program coordinator at the Anacostia Community Museum, supervises while students Donovan Eason (center) and DaWayne Walker run a chemical test on a water sample.
“Is the net like a Spongebob jellyfish net?” student Cristal Sandoval asked. Alison Cawood, citizen science coordinator at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC), used another analogy to explain: “It’s like a bowl with holes in it for pasta.” Light bulbs came on around the room and a knowing, “Oh,” escaped the lips of at least a dozen students.
