Farewell to fish tails...

Now that I have returned home safely and jumped right back into work with the Forest Service I figured it is about time to reflect on my final thoughts from Australia and wrap up the fish tails until my next adventure!  Just about 6 months ago I arrived in Australia without a place to live, not knowing anyone, and not much of a sense of what to expect at work or where work (or anything for that matter) even was!  Since then I have vastly expanded my professional scope of skills and experiences, made amazing friends, travelled a beautiful country and had opportunities to try all sorts of new things from SCUBA diving to vegemite to hang gliding.  Although the NMSC offered an atmosphere that could leave some feeling lost at first, and unsure of what projects to jump into or what initiatives to kick off, it was perfect for a self-driven intern and employee like myself.  Specific tasks that I needed to accomplish on a weekly basis were outlined but the rest of my time was driven by my research interests as I had a large say as to which researchers and projects I would be working with so that I could be both useful to them as well as take advantage of the vast learning opportunities.  I spent the majority of my time working in the Ocean Acidification Lab, Aquaculture Facilities, Bycath Reduction, Marine Organisms Genetics (specifically mollusks), Scuba fish and coral surveys, as well as working some weekends in the aquarium giving fish talks and I even dabbled with a little bartending (outside the center that is).  I was able to dive at least a few times a week, spend time in the field, on research vessels, commercial fishing boats, in the lab and in the aquarium.  This multiplicity of experiences was what I appreciate most about my time in Australia as it helped me to exceed my primary goal of diversifying and expanding my range of fisheries research experience, specifically to from freshwater to marine environments. 

The most valuable advice I could give to future students interested in such a program is to go into the experience with an entirely open mind and take advantage of any opportunity that comes your way.  Working, interning and travelling abroad helped to grow personally and professionally on many levels.  I found the experience to be immensely fulfilling as well as opening up so many opportunities for my future career.  Many thanks to everyone that has helped to make this wonderful experience possible! Until my next adventure, this is all for Fish Tails (from Down Under)……………..

The Final Aussie Adventure

Needless to say my final weeks in Australia were a hectic few, scrambling to finish up the mollusk collecting and dissecting and wrap up all other remaining projects at work as well as trying to squeeze in one last adventure to explore the Great Ocean Road and Melbourne.  There were quite a few late nights in the lab but we successfully obtained tissue samples from a wide range of mollusk families at a variety of eastern locations.  The samples are all packed in their microplates and ready to be shipped off to Canada to have their barcodes read!  The main challenge we encountered was trying to preserve the shell for taxonomic records of each tissue sample we collected, in many cases we simply had to smash the shell to obtain the tissue.  As the first primary marine mollusk collection for the Barcode of Life we anticipated encountering some challenges to work through and hoped to use our experiences to create a standard protocol for future collections so I consider it a success and am thrilled to have gotten to the initiative going, as it will continue on at the Marine Center until no mollusk is left behind!

                Beyond the late nights in the lab I was also able to squeeze in my trip to Victoria.  We flew into Melbourne, at which point we rented a Wicked Van (fully equipped with road trip camping essentials and raunchy slogans and paintings all over it) and set out on the Great Ocean Road.  The drive was amazing as we headed west along the Victorian coast line and stopped at the iconic spots such as Bells Beach and the 12 Apostles and some quiet spots for some great hiking and more koalas than I ever would have imagined seeing in the wild.  On the return drive we took a bit of a detour to Lake Elizabeth which is known for its platypus sightings, but after many hours of traipsing through the rain in search of platypus I finally had to accept that I wasn’t going to get to cross “seeing a platypus” off my bucket list just yet (which gives me more of an excuse to head back to Australia sooner than later I suppose).  I was however fortunate enough to get to see a colony of fairy penguins as we made our way back to Melbourne; and still had time to visit the aquarium, casino and museum before I returned to Coffs to pack up and say my final goodbyes.  All in all, it was a great little adventure to wrap up the enormous adventure that my time in Australia has been!