Hey everyone!
We’ve been wicked
busy doing research, cleanup, and education in the Gulf of Maine and
Boston. We’re admittedly a little bit behind with our updates, so here’s a snapshot of our adventures during the
past few weeks on the quest for a clean ocean!
After a big crew change in Rockland, Maine, we sailed to
Hurricane Island. This was the
beginning of two weeks of research with five brilliant scientists from the
University of Exeter, England doing PONAR sediment grabs (keep your eyes out
for a link to a great video) and Neuston tows! These “science under sail”
methods make it possible to capture zooplankton and sediment dwelling animals
to then find whether or not they ingest microplastics. This research is exciting because it may show us if
microplastics are entering the bottom levels of the food web.
We were greeted at the Hurricane Island Center for Science
and Leadership by fantastic hosts who taught us about the islandʼs sustainable infrastructure, including
composting toilet systems and solar panels. Another important learning experience happened, too - the
Brits had their first sʼmores during a 4th
of July celebration!
In Boothbay, Maine, we had the opportunity to meet up with our friends at the Boothbay Sea and Science Center who, like us, are working to get kids out on the water and involved in ocean research. We toured the Bigelow Labs, home to some awesome marine research from the smallest of ocean creatures on up.
Our next stop was Portland, Maine, where we participated in
Portland Green Drinks. Though the
Maine Yacht Center, where the event was hosted, is a bit of a journey out of
town, more than 400 people came out to the event. We were blown away by their enthusiasm and it had the strongest attendance of any of our events yet!
We continued on to the Isles of Shoals to research and had the
chance to explore Star Island and learn about the local ecology. One evening, we hosted some of the
Pelicans (Star Island staff) on American Promise, enjoying the best
bioluminescent show we had ever seen!
Excited to proceed to our big week of education, we sailed
down to Boston via Kittery and Gloucester, enjoying great weather and singing
sea chanteys during a couple long days under sail. In Boston, we set up shop at the Courageous Sailing Center
at the Charlestown Navy Yard. The
beautiful view of Boston as we arrived put us all in agreement that Boston by
boat is the way to go!
Our first day of education was spent at Community Boating,
arriving via the Charles River, which inspired one of our Mission Atlantic
reports about the locks and seasonal fish ladder systems. During our education program at CBI,
Hector (our ROV) recovered his first key ever and we even found its owner. One
of our students was inspired to make his own ROV at home. We always love to see
what methods the kids are inspired to create to clean the oceans on their
own!
Throughout the week, we worked with several hundred kids and their phenomenal instructors with the Courageous Sailing Center
programs in Charlestown, Community Boating on the Charles, and at Jamaica Pond. Between boat tours and American Promise history lessons,
Hector flying time, surface dipnetting and dock tows, we were able to immerse
the students in everything that Rozalia Project is about, “immerse” being the
operative word. As Hector raised
bilge tubes and plastic cups to the surface covered in sediment sludge, the
kids were shown an accurate representation of ocean cleanup, which can
sometimes get a bit messy! This
theme continued on one of our favorite afternoons of surface cleanup with the programʼs Instructors in Training. A torrential downpour in Boston
presented the opportunity for a lesson in interconnectedness as all of the
litter from the cityʼs streets washed
down storm drains and bubbled up into the harbor. We only spent 30 minutes wrangling this trash but ended up
grabbing 507 pieces in total!! An
enormous proportion of our haul was made up by food wrappers, but each one had
at least a couple of micro debris pieces hanging on for the ride.
We're now back at
our home base in Kittery, doing some final research and
development on our Baleen Basker and fondly reminiscing
about the past 4 weeks aboard American Promise.
A huge thank you to our partners - we couldn't do it without you:
Rockland Public Dock
The team from the University of Exeter: Dr. Tamara Galloway, Dr. Ceri Lewis, Dr. Andrew Watts, Stephanie Wright & Matthew Cole
The team from the University of Exeter: Dr. Tamara Galloway, Dr. Ceri Lewis, Dr. Andrew Watts, Stephanie Wright & Matthew Cole
Sam and crew at the Hurricane Island Center for Science and
Leadership
Nicole at Bigelow Labs
Pauline, Ed and everyone at Boothbay Sea and Science Center
Tom and Debrah Yale
Maine Yacht Center
Portland Green Drinks
Portland Green Drinks
Star Island staff
Kittery Point Yacht Yard
Dave, Kate, Rebecca and crew at Courageous Sailing Center
Ginger, Colin and crew at Community Boating, Inc.
New England Aquarium Harbor Explorations summer camp
The Boston Harbor Association interns
Berwind Family Foundation interns
Bonnell Cove Foundation of the Cruising Club of America
In-Kind sponsors: Interlux, Cloth n'Canvas, OCENS, Select Design, Scully Interactive
Bonnell Cove Foundation of the Cruising Club of America
In-Kind sponsors: Interlux, Cloth n'Canvas, OCENS, Select Design, Scully Interactive
OʼConnor family
and this summer's funding partners: 11th Hour Racing, American Chemistry Council, Berwind Family Foundation, Kilroy Realty Corporation, Boat US Foundation, State of Maine Clean Marine Diesel Program/Maine Marine Trades, Lake Champlain Basin Program, WND&WVS and our generous contributors to the Annual Fund
and this summer's funding partners: 11th Hour Racing, American Chemistry Council, Berwind Family Foundation, Kilroy Realty Corporation, Boat US Foundation, State of Maine Clean Marine Diesel Program/Maine Marine Trades, Lake Champlain Basin Program, WND&WVS and our generous contributors to the Annual Fund
Thanks for reading!
For a clean ocean,
Rozalia Project interns AF, SC, and TM
