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Yesterdays demersal trawl was unsuccessful and so we picked up speed and raced to the start of the Mawson box to do a routine RMT before dinner.
After dinner we continued with target trawls until midnight, with one last routine trawl at the northern end of the transects.
The purpose of the target trawls is to identify features (coloured blobs!) that appear on the echo sounder and then run the RMT through them, thus proving what the blob contains.
Blobs appear in different sizes, shapes and colours and at different depths in the water column. The colour defines the strength of the returned signal and therefore, possibly the density of the object.
So far we have been focusing on relatively small red and yellow (relatively dense) blobs which seem to contain mostly krill. Yesterday evening we targeted a larger blue blob.
The blue blob returned a catch of Antarctic Silverfish. Small sardine like creatures. Apparently they have been commercially fished in the past although they are tricky to process as they contain lots of lipids which they use for buoyancy, rather than a swim bladder. Apparently therefore, they're not that tasty on toast!
The Science Coordinator is still catching more 'monsters from the deep' on his shift than the VL which makes us suspicious, as he is the Keeper Of the Chocolate Supplies...
Cheers,
Andy and Simon
Map
A map showing Australia and Antarctica. The map shows the journey of one voyage that has occured in the season, with each route highlighted in a distinct colour.