Day 5- Sampling the Sea Floor in Antarctica. Virtual Field Trip

What does benthic mean and what sorts of animals live in the benthic community?
What do sessile (non-moving) creatures tend to eat?
What types of feeders are sea urchins compared with sea stars?

 
The benthic community from LEARNZ on Vimeo.

What are the scientists trying to work out?
How are results recorded?
What can Sal and his team do to improve the accuracy of their results?

 
Sampling the sea floor from LEARNZ on Vimeo.


How does Rebecca catch fish from under the sea ice?
What does Rebecca use to attract the fish?
What does Rebecca want to find out from these fish?

 
Ice fishing from LEARNZ on Vimeo.

Sampling antarctic sea floor

By Arthur

Benthic communities  

• Benthic animals are animals that live on the bottom of the sea bed.

                  

• They eat differently.
• Sponges will eat really small stuff.
• Bigger things like starfishes will eat slightly bigger things
• The food web

           Sampling the sea floor

• They take things with them to take samples.
• They take samples from different places.
• They have cameras with them at all times.

            Ice fishing

• There are 2 species of ice fish.
• The ice fishes are very low down in the food web.
• They drill down to get to the sea ice.
• There is a light on the end of the fishing rod to attract the fishes where it is dark.

Sampling the sea floor in Antarctica

The Benthic community.

What does benthic mean and what sorts of animals live in the benthic community?

What do sessile (non-moving)

Facts:

Benthic animals living on the bottom attached to the bottom don’t move as much as sea stars and worm like creatures. If you take something out of a food web it isn’t a food web anymore. If something comes out of the food web the food web could collapse.

Sampling the sea floor

They point a machine at the ice to see how brown it is. Sometimes just go around with a normal waterproof camera.

Ice Fishing

If there’s snow covered fish you have to dig through the snow, looking at fishes muscles, you can look at the ring to see how old a fish is.

By Milly and Anna

Day 4- Sea Stars and Urchins

Sea stars and urchins from LEARNZ on Vimeo.
Where does the Antarctic cushion star live? Where do these Antarctic cushion stars fit into the food web? What do these urchins use their spines for?

Molly: The cushion star fish are full of water.

Hunter: The Antarctic cushion stars are the size of a hand

Milly: They live between 80- 100 years.

Wilbur: When it is hotter, they breathe more.

George: The sea urchins have skeletons on the outside of their bodies.

Josie:  Larger crabs and bigger sea stars eat the cushion star fish.

Anna: Sea stars feel squishy because they are full of water.

 

Sea Stars and Urchins

Sea Stars

Sea stars are called the Antarctic cushion stars, they feel squishy and are full of water.

Cushion stars are the size of a hand, they live in the dark. They live as long as 80-100 years, they are scavengers, they eat other things.

A large crab eats them, and bigger sea stars too.

Urchins

They are fatter and bigger than star cushions, they search around in the dark for food, they eat plankton.

When they are hot, they breathe faster, if they breathe faster everyday they can’t cope and get stressed.

They have their skeleton on the outside.

Sea Urchins: The Wet Lab

If they're stressed out they breathe faster. The water in the experiment is the same as the temperature in the southern ocean. They will test 50 different star cushions so that it is a fair test.

By Anna

SEA STARS AND URCHINS

• Their bodies are full of water
• The Antarctic cushion star is the size of a palm
• They are fragile
• Sea stars live to 80 to 100 years
• They are scavengers
• Urchins have their skeletons on the outside of their body
• Smaller animals use less oxygen
• When starfish get too hot they start to breathe faster

By George

Science in the wet lab from LEARNZ on Vimeo.

The fair test: science in action from LEARNZ on Vimeo.
What is a control? Why has Kate collected Antarctic cushion stars from more than one place? How many sea stars is Kate sending back to New Zealand?

Antarctic Cushion Stars

• They are pink
• They live in bottom of the sea
• They are squishy on top
• They are the same size as a hand
• They live in the dark and up to 80-100 years
• When they get to the size of a palm they don't grow anymore
• They eat dead things
• Their bodies are full of water

By Milly

Day 3- Skidoo to Cape Evans

Skidoo to Cape Evans from LEARNZ on Vimeo.
What is the speed limit on skidoo in Antarctica? How did you know where to go on the skidoo? What is the name of the hut at Cape Evans and why is it significant?
Preparing to dive from LEARNZ on Vimeo.
What equipment is used? What do the divers wear? How long are the dives?
SIMCO - Sea Ice Microbial Communities from LEARNZ on Vimeo.
What is SIMCO? How can you tell where SIMCO are growing? What eats SIMCO and how does SIMCO contribute to the food web? Next step learning: Find out how scientists know if animals are getting energy from SIMCO or phytoplankton from the open ocean.
Sampling SIMCO from LEARNZ on Vimeo.
Why are the scientists collecting samples of SIMCO and photographing the ice? Where is SIMCO mostly found? What would make this research more accurate?

Day 2- Meet the scientists from Otago University and a helicopter flight out to Cape Bird to take samples from the penguin colony- Virtual Field Trip to Antarctica

Created with Padlet

Flying to Cape Bird from LEARNZ on Vimeo.

Why Cape Bird from LEARNZ on Vimeo.

Penguins from LEARNZ on Vimeo.

Collecting guano from LEARNZ on Vimeo.

Doing science in remote places in Antarctica from LEARNZ on Vimeo.

Day 1- Heading to Antarctica- Virtual Field Trip

Write in the comments section if you have any questions for the scientists...

We have begun to find out about Antarctica.

The crew have made their trip from Christchurch to Antarctica. 

Journey to Antarctica from LEARNZ on Vimeo.

We took some notes:

Antarctica Vehicles

To get there they got on a C 17 US Air Force plane (massive!!) then to get around on the ice they had snow cats and custom named Ivan the Terra bus. They all had tracks and wheels designed to be great for the ice!

Now and again they had to drill into the ice to see how thick and safe the ice was.

By Leo and Jack

Antartica

In Antartica it is dry with not much moisture, so you need to take a lot of Water you also have another bottle which you pee in so DO NOT mix the two up! You have to have layers of clothes which includes Jackets, Wind Breakers and other layers of Clothing. There is a piece of Clothing for every part of the body so it is basically only your eyes uncovered. Interesting Fact is that Antartica is around 50 times our size and is the Coldest, Driest and Windiest country. 90% of the world's ice is in Antartica.

By Gretel

Watch this clip to find out about what to wear and how to stay safe in Antarctica: 

Staying safe in Antarctica from LEARNZ on Vimeo.

We found out what to wear...


What to wear from Matariki on Vimeo.

Antarctica: Cool Science in Action

We are enrolled in a virtual field trip to Antarctica from 3-7 November. 

Introduction to Antarctica - cool science on ice from LEARNZ on Vimeo.

Here is the field trip plan:

Monday 3 November	Jump aboard the US Airforce C17 Globemaster aircraft in Christchurch and begin your journey to the great southern continent of Antarctica. Complete your Antarctic Field Training so you are ready and equipped to safely work with scientists out on the sea ice.
Tuesday 4 November	Explore Scott Base and meet the scientists from Otago University to discover more about how science is done down in Antarctica.
Wednesday 5 November	Get your ECW (Extreme Cold Weather) clothing on and travel out on to the sea ice to investigate Sea Ice Microbial Communities (SIMCO) and dive below the ice to collect samples.
Thursday 6 November	Visit seal haul outs and penguin colonies to collect samples to see how SIMCO contribute to the diet of these animals.
Friday 7 November	See how scientists manage the challenges of working in Antarctica and find out more about how this research will help us to better understand the impacts of climate change.

Each day Nicola will run a workshop looking at video diary entries and we will be taking notes and writing about it on our blog. We will be able to ask questions to experts who are working in Antarctica.

On that note, Eleanor's dad is working over there at the moment! 

"I am down here now at Scott Base and the weather is diabolical.

I have attached a photo of our field camp site from last year at Cape Evans (the site of Scott's 1909 Hutt, you can see it in the foreground of the photo). My sleeping tent was the little triangular yellow one on the very left hand side of the photo.

I will send some photos to if you like when we get back at the end of November.

Say hi to Ellen for me! 

Neill" 

Created with Padlet

If you want to find out more:

http://www.antarctica.org.nz/ Antarctica 

www.heritage-antarctica.org Antarctic Heritage Trust 

www.antarctic-link.org.nz  Antarctic Link Canterbury 

www.antarcticanz.govt.nz Antarctica NZ

www.victoria.ac.nz/antarctic Antarctic Research Centre 

www.coolantarctica.com Cool Antarctica 

www.anta.canterbury.ac.nz Gateway Antarctica