For the first two weeks of January, lab research assistant Eliza Moore joined Jon, Robbie, and Franz in the Galapagos. Eliza has been with the Witman lab analyzing barnacle slides and fish behavior videos as well as managing our databases since 2012, but this was her first opportunity to see the field sites in person. She spent five days of the trip diving, mainly assisting with deployment of fish cams and barnacle settlement plates. Below, Eliza poses with a Porites coral at one of the Witman Lab's permanent coral transects on Guy Fawkes Island.
On the very first dive of the trip, as Eliza and Robbie fixed plates to the rock walls at Baltra, they glanced over their shoulders to see six 10-foot scalloped hammerheads gliding gracefully by! It was quite a welcome for the first-timer. The final dive of her trip was also pretty sharky, with several black-tip reef sharks curiously observing the scientists at work at Guy Fawkes.
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Between camera deployments, Eliza had plenty of time to explore, visiting the small benthic organisms she has observed in so many quadrapod slides (over 2000 of them!) up close and personal! With the La Nina conditions in full swing, the invertebrate communities at most sites were lively and lush!
Four days of diving were while living aboard the Queen Mabel – Eliza finally experienced the Witman Lab motto: “Dive – Eat – Repeat”! Jonas Lechert, a graduate student studying at the Darwin Station joined the Witman team for the Queen Mabel cruise, and we were all able to assist in each other’s research.
 |  Back on dry land, Eliza spent time wandering the research station, birding, and visiting the land iguanas and tortoises. One of the tortoises, Diego, was once living at the San Diego Zoo – Eliza used to live about a half-mile from there, so they reminisced together about what they agree is America’s Finest City. |
 | Two weeks flew by, and Eliza headed back to Providence, with a flash-drive full of new barnacle slides to analyze. The rest of the lab followed a couple weeks later. |  |
