The moon and the rabbit

Hey everyone!

If one thing is for sure then that interning with the HKDCS certainly never gets dull and I am looking back at an interesting and eventful week.

It started off with no dolphin sightings from the Tai Ho Wan land-based station. To make up for the lack of dolphins, we had many sightings during boat surveys later that week, including some very active individuals spy-hopping and breaching and head-lunging all around the boat.

This week was also the week of the Mid-Autumn- or Moon-Festival, an important holiday of the Chinese culture. As the name implies, it’s to celebrate the Moon and everybody had a day off. There also are fairs with light shows, sweets, dancing dragons and lots of people – everybody wearing or carrying some sort of colourful light. And eating mooncakes.

The moon and the rabbit are closely tied together by Chinese legends. Thus it might not seem really surprising that the Moon-Festival was followed by typhoon Usagi (which means “rabbit” in Japanese). It even made it into the news as the biggest and strongest storm on Earth this year. And it does look a bit like a rabbit, doesn’t it? As it was aiming for a direct hit we of course had to cancel all our scheduled surveys. 

                                                                  (Source)

                                                                   (Source)

So I staid put in Tai O for two days and followed the track of the cyclone online. Having never been in a typhoon, as we don’t get such things in Germany, it was actually quite interesting to see the track changing with sometimes funny bends, track predictions, strength changes and so on. Of course there was a big tautness, especially because till the very last no one knew whether Usagi would eventually hit the city of Hong Kong, or not. After following the course of the coastline for a while and thus really aiming for us, it decided to turn north-west-wards a little earlier, taking most of its strength with it.  Though it wasn’t the first typhoon this season, it still was the most powerful and closest in a long time. While I never felt unsafe and it certainly was an interesting experience, I nevertheless do hope that it was the last one for this year.

There she goes again

Hey there. Another week has passed and it’s time for a little update from Hong Kong. Last week started of with a Welcome and Goodbye dinner (bye bye Danielle!). It was so much fun and all we foreigners were amazed about how much the others managed to eat: while we were full after halfway through, the team continued and kept ordering and ordering all different kinds of delicious looking foods. I wished I wasn’t full, because they really looked and smelled yummy!

Another highlight of this week certainly was the visit of an acoustic expert, who provided us with a brief introduction into acoustic work. It was so interesting and I certainly hope to get a little more insight into it during the next couple of weeks.

We also tried to find porpoises this week, but they still remain a mystery at the moment. To not be too disappointed though, and after teasing us with some waves, the weather god appeased us with a beautiful light show on our way home.

There is so much going on at the moment here at HKDCS and these are busy times. So I’m really looking forward what else is to come.

Anke

Farewell Hong Kong!

             I’m currently sitting here writing this last blog post at the airport, waiting for my flight home to Canada. My time here in Hong Kong with the Dolphin Conservation Society was incredible. I can’t even begin to describe how much I learned about cetacean research and even the Hong Kong culture. The staff at HKDCS was so welcoming and kind. Because of their hospitality I felt very comfortable and at home here in Hong Kong.

            My last few weeks of work were amazing. We had some really great sightings where the dolphins were very active, socializing and breaching right in front of us. We also conducted a couple porpoise surveys, and even though we didn’t get many sightings the scenery is always so beautiful in those regions of Hong Kong. Finally a few of our theodolite-tracking sessions from the airport were quite successful due to some rare dolphin sightings within the airport exclusion zone.

            All in all I learned so many different research techniques and protocols, which I never would have known had I not completed this internship. I got the opportunity to help conserve an amazing species within a rapidly developing city. I had the experience of learning a new culture and trying new things, which I never would have been exposed to otherwise! This experience taught me so much about cetaceans, about cultures, and about myself as well! I would recommend interning at the HKDCS to anyone who is interested in environmental issues. It will be the experience of a lifetime!

            Many thanks to everyone I met this summer. You all will be sorely missed!

Signing off,

Danielle

The new one

Guten Tag!

My name is Anke and I will be the new intern at the HKDCS for the next two months. Back In Germany I’ve almost finished my Diplom in Biology/Ecology, but I’ve wanted to come to Hong Kong to do cetacean research for a long time now. I’ve already seen dolphins in quite a few rather natural places, but it is fascinating how dolphins actually live in such an urban place like Hong Kong, which for me has always been synonymous with skyscrapers and high ship traffic. It is only natural, that these animals face a high risk of endangerment in such a fast developing and anthropogenic place. Luckily the HKDCS is doing intensive research in order to protect not only the Chinese white dolphin but also the more elusive finless porpoise, because we still know little about both species. Especially habitat preferences but also behavior could be critically affected by all the human influences.

This first week of my stay was full of training and full of rain. During the first three days I’ve been on boats to get introduced to line-transect surveys, which – though I knew the theory – I’ve never done before. It is great to still learn new things after having done quite a bit of cetacean research already. With new projects you always learn so many new things, not only techniques, but also research approaches, new obstacles and – of course – new species. Unfortunately the rain continued for three days straight, it’s still the rainy season after all. We however still managed to see dolphins – my very first sighting in fact was of two mother-calf pairs, and the calves even did some spy-hopping. On another day, one dolphin was breaching quite a few times. Dolphins indeed never fail to enlighten me.

Funny enough, the other days were the complete opposite: I helped with land-based theodolite-tracking and the sun was burning down on us. Again there was so much to learn. It was really interesting and actually quite shocking to see how much boating of all imaginable sizes is going on, although I’ve been told that the traffic is still comparatively low in this station.

I enjoy being both on boats and on land and I know how important the combination of different platforms is. Land-based surveys can at times be challenging because you only see dolphins from far away while putting in long days of work. But they do provide so important information.

I’ve also already met quite a few people from the team and couldn’t have faced a nicer welcome. I’m really looking forward to spending the next weeks working with those people, helping with all the different ongoing projects, and contributing my little share to the conservation of those precious animals. I’m sure there will be countless and great experiences laying ahead of me.

That’s it for now,

Anke