Monitoring Traps Back In The Water At Site 277

It’s hard to say what’s going on, but for our first time out to Site 277 we certainly found much less in our traps this weekend with 2 traps totally empty. Is it the time of year or is something else going on?
It’s hard to say what’s going on, but for our first time out to Site 277 we certainly found much less in our traps this weekend with 2 traps totally empty. Is it the time of year or is something else going on?
First Survey site 277
Theresa and Denise getting ready to start recording the data from our traps.
Site 277 beach survey

Titlow Beach AKA Site 277

We met with our teammates Denise and Don earlier in the month and they brought us up to speed with the new protocols for this year’s monitoring. Nothing major but a couple of small tweeks with the reporting process.

Last year we actually weren’t out in the field until much later in the season. I believe it was due to the paperwork involved in registering a new site within a municipal park. Last years late summer weather was exceptionally dry and I felt sure that starting in spring this year we’d have to endure some chill and rain.

Not that case for April! We arrive at our site to conduct our Molt Hunt, beach survey and set traps to a pristine day of cool temperatures but plenty of sunshine.

We didn’t find much in the way of molts, but I didn’t expect too. A bit early for the crabs to be molting. Our beach hadn’t changed since last year so no surprise there either.

traps
Getting our traps ready for the new monitoring season.
beach survey site 277
Recording our findings from randomly selected quadrants.
Collecting Traps
Don bringing in the first trap of the season from Titlow Beach.

What did surprise me was the small number of crabs and fish we pulled in on Sunday. Just a couple of Three-Spined StickleBack (Gasterosteus aculeatus) and 4 Hairy Shore Crab (Hemigapsus oregonensis).

Perhaps it’s just the time of year as well, but I’ll be anxious to see what the results of May bear out.

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