Sierra Wild

Day 6: Overall we feel as though this service learning day went really well! We began the day as we always do. We all met in our assigned classroom. We all started our morning together for the last time. It is so sad that our group will not be continuing onto next year. The seniors from this year who started the group as juniors last year, (juliana, ashton, anna, ryan and myself) have put in so much effort into making sure this group was successful and helpful to our community. We did not talk of future plans for next time since this was our last time. We did however talk about the plans for the day. We created a 6 step plan for the day. We started by first continuing our PCR of the existing extractions from last service learning day. If you recall in my last blog, my species were tiny shrimp. We added our PCR samples into different containers with a PCR solution. We then placed the DNA solution in the the PCR thermocycler. This will help separate the double helix strands so that we can better read the DNA. Once this was complete and all of our samples were in the thermocycler. It was time to start the second step of our day. This was to go out to our individual locations to retrieve the last of our traps. My group consisted of Juliana, Anna, Ryan and myself. We went back to Ryan’s grandparents house to retrieve our final trap. This one we knew would be a bit of a struggle since this trap was far into the water attached to the pillar of the dock. Ryan reached into the water with another PVC pipe to push the trap out from under the zip ties. We thought it would float to the top. However we underestimated its weight and it sank to the bottom. Unfortunately none of us were prepared to dive into the deep water to retrieve it. We very sorrowfully then returned to school with no trap unfortunately. Once we returned, it was time to commence the third step of the day. This was to quickly sort/preserve the remaining species that were retrieved from the other docks. Once we yet again sorted out the species, we then moved to step four. This was to repeat the process of last service learning day, which is DNA extractions. We took the new species we collected today, and we repeated the steps we took last month. This is described in detail on my previous blog. After we completed this, we went onto step five. This was to retrieve our PCR mixtures from the thermocycler. Our next step was to place them into gel electrophoresis. This process uses electricity to separate DNA fragments by size as they migrate through a gel matrix. Gel electrophoresis can be used to separate DNA fragments. Using a pipette, DNA samples are loaded into slots made in the agarose gel. The DNA samples are colorless, but researchers add a blue "tracking" dye. This is a simple yet tricky process as many things can go wrong. If any other DNA sample is somehow placed into the same gel as one of our species, the DNA sample will be altered. This would make it more difficult for us to read it. Once this was complete, our final step of the day was to write our blogs which is what I am doing now. This was an extremely productive day. A positive would be getting together as a group to sample DNA for the last time. A negative would be that our traps is in the bottom of the ocean somewhere and we have no way to retrieve it, but it’s all good! It is all about trial and error. I will miss this group dearly next year and hopefully it can be started up again in the future. Thanks for reading:)

Day 6: I thought that today was a very fun and productive service learning day!! It was super exciting and we got a lot done. To start off the day, we all met in our assigned classroom to go over today's objectives. The juniors had to go off to meet with the rest of their grade to look at options for next year. The seniors however stayed behind and started to DNA sequence our species. In our past service learning days, we set out traps and collected species. We then each chose a vile of a certain creature from the location of our traps. We first took two vile’s and put our numbers on top of them. My numbers were 7 and 8. We then took two creatures, I chose the ones that look like baby shrimp, and we placed one into each of our vile’s. We then added 180 ml of buffer to each of the vile’s. I added half of it, then crushed my shrimp with a pestle and then added the rest of the buffer. After that we completed we added 20 ml of proteinase to the mixture and then shook it around. We finally placed our vile’s in a styrofoam holder so that it would float in a hot water bath for a couple hours. This is all for the PCR process or polymerase chain reaction which is essentially a way to sequence the DNA of an unknown species so that we could properly place it into a marine life family. This relates to helping our community because we are researching species off of our coast for the state and coast guard who is curious to see what we have out there. We spend time each month getting together to use courage and compassion to be able to work for our community towards a common goal. My group after we completed this, went back to Ryan’s grandparents house so that we could collect one of our traps. It was me, Juliana, Ryan, and Anna who are all seniors, who went out to this specific dock in Newport Beach. First when we arrived, we pulled out of the water our old trap, which was the one we placed there last month and placed it in a bucket leaving most of its water with it. We then returned to campus with our bucket trap that is full of tons of new specimens! We saw a lot of little shrimps and worms in this batch which is very interesting. Next month we plan on looking at the DNA we sequenced to see our results. I tried to take some photos however the lighting and conditions were not well enough for good photography. Overall it was a pretty successful day because we collected and did a lot with our group. I was very proud of what our group accomplished.

Day 5: I think that overall today was a very successful service learning day!! It was super fun and I had an awesome time with my group. To start off the day, we all met in our assigned classroom to go over today's objectives. My main goal for the morning was to make sure that everyone knew where to be and when to be there. So once that was out of the way, we decided as a group to go out and retrieve at least one of our traps for inspection. My group went back to Ryan’s grandparents house so that we could collect one of our traps. It was me, Juliana, Ashton, Ryan, and Anna who are all seniors, who went out to this specific dock. We first went to a hardware store to get rope and a large weight that would help weight down our new trap that we were planning on setting. The weight that we got was a large metal hook. It had a good amount of weight to them so that they would not move around as much under water. We wanted to attach the new trap to the cleat by Ryan’s grandparents boat. First when we arrived, we pulled out of the water our old trap and placed it in a bucket. We then put our new bucket trap into the water. We attached a rope to it, and then slowly lowered it into the water, making sure to measure how deep we were sending it. Which in this case, was about two and a half feet in the water at high tide. Ryan then tied the rope off on the cleat on the dock. We then returned to campus and we observed the specimens that we found on our traps. We saw a lot of little shrimps and worms. We also got two larger shrimps and that was pretty exciting!! We then separated all of our findings into a tube each depending on the species type. Next month we plan on collecting this trap and we might add another one if we have time. We didn't focus on taking many pictures this trip because we feel that we needed everyone to have a hands on experience while collecting the traps. Overall it was a pretty successful day. I was very proud of what our group accomplished.

Day 4: I think that overall today was our best service learning day yet!! It was super duper successful and I had an awesome time with my group. To start off the day, we all met in our assigned classroom to go over today's objectives. My main goal for the morning portion was to make sure that everyone knew how to write the group blog because I have been the only one who has been writing it for the past three service learning days. So once that was out of the way. We decided as a group that we needed to figure out our main objectives for the rest of the year. Ashton wrote everything on the board that we came up with. Once that was done, we realized as a group that our main goal of the day was to get out there and set our traps. Ryan came up with the idea to call his grandparents and see if we could tie some traps on their docks in Newport Beach. They very kindly were cool with it. It was me, Juliana, Ashton, Ryan, and Anna who are all seniors, who went out to this specific dock. We first went to a hardware store to get rope and large zip ties that would fit around a pillar on the dock. We then went to CVS to get a lighter to scorch the ends of the ropes, and some weights for the traps. Our weights in this case were “Baby’s First Christmas” ornaments. They had a good amount of weight to them so that they would not move around as much under water. We wanted to attach one trap to the cleat by Ryan’s grandparents boat, and then we wanted to attach the other one directly to the pillar in the water on the dock. This one would require someone to get in the water. Anna, was so brave enough as to volunteer to be the one in our group to go into the cold water. First, we tackled the trap attached to the cleat. We pulled a rope to it, and then slowly lowered it into the water, making sure to measure how deep we were sending it. Which in this case, was about two and a half feet in the water at low tide. Ryan then tied the rope off on the cleat on the dock. The next trap we set, Anna had to get in the water. We chose to attach our last one to the pillar attached to the dock. However it was only reachable by diving in. Anna swam to it from shore. She then was handed the trap. After a few trial and errors. We decided to pull some rope through the trap and then tied it together. We then pulled the zip tie through the rope, so that it was extra secure to the pillar. All and all, it was pretty successful. I was very proud of what our group accomplished today. We knew what we wanted to do and we went out there and did it.

Day 3: Today was our second full day of our scuba group. We started the morning off by talking as a group about what dates we should use for up coming diving and setting of traps. We decided that on the rest of the service learning dates of the school year, we are planning on going out and setting/collecting traps while also diving so that we can get a good amount of species to collect and observe. We worked pretty well as a group to be able to come up with these dates. We then went into the lab and started to work on a new way of building traps. I definitly liked this way of building traps better. It was super simple but really affective. We took a PVC pipe and then used zip ties to attach 26 strings onto the pipe in rows of three. We will then be attaching these traps to the sides of the docks so that they will not float away or be possibly damaged. I think that these will be more successful than the first traps that we built. They were also immensely easier to build which was not as much of a challenge as it was last time. After building we were sent to lunch. When we returned to lunch, we used ocean water and algae that Micheal and Ian collected earlier in the day to observe the sea creatures living within there. We separated them into their own containers so that we could take a better look at smaller samples. By looking at these small samples, we can easily see each individual species. I found a bunch of cute little brittle stars in my container and I then carefully moved them into a dish so that I could observe them under the microscope. I also found some other little organisms to look at as well. Unfortunately the light got too hot and my creatures died and that was really sad. Overall today was a very successful day and I enjoyed it truly.

Day 2: Today during COAST, we stayed in the classroom the whole day. We each split up into separate groups and were assigned a topic of the spiny lobster to research and discuss. This took about 2 hours of typing and reading to find a substantial amount of information that was necessary for us to learn about our species and the traps needed to capture them. It was quite disappointing to sit in a classroom the whole day and read, but I guess it was necessary enough in order to get the kind of information we need. I hope that in the future our group can be more collaborative instead of sitting listening to our leader talk as if we are in class for the whole day. I enjoyed learning about the kind of traps that we could use to enforce our data collection. It was very interesting to see what was needed and what was effective. I did not enjoy however having our leader stand and read our own notes to us, I thought it was going to be a collaborative community presentation where each group showed us their notes and read them to us. I feel as though it could have been more of a conversation instead of a lecture. Starting to think about traps and building them was an interesting experience. It was fun to look at what works and what does not.  I honestly felt that 2 hours was an unnecessary amount of time and it seemed like busy work. I believe that we, as a group, she be able to get out of the classroom and be creative with how we do our research and how we spend our time. I did not learn anything new about myself today. We did not do anything on this day that was conducive to the community so therefore, I was not changed nor affected by anything we did. I do not believe that I have any challenges with how I communicate or collaborate with our group. I think that our group as a whole needs to be more collaborative and focus on the task at hand, while also being able to talk to one another. Overall, it was an average school day.

Day 1: My name is Sierra Wild and I am a returning member from COAST last year. What draws me to this group is the idea of the ocean. Personally I have never been a huge fan of the ocean, however I was drawn to the idea of scuba diving and helping in marine research. Last year, my group and I became scuba certified. It was such an amazing experience for me. Being out underwater is such a life changing experience. It is so calming and serene. It was a very fun experience as well in our group. I am hoping that this year we will be able to get into the water more. I love diving and I hope that as a group we will be able to get out of the classroom this year and into the ocean. I am sad that we are no longer learning about starfish, however I am looking forward to learning about the spiny lobster. Overall I am excited to start the year.