Madeline Baird
Oyster Survivorship Testing
I assisted in an experiment to thermally stress out oysters to figure out how we can a) observe how they die and b) at what temperature they die at in order to create a timeline for future long term temperature stress experiments. The incubator was started at 9:23 am with 12 larger oysters and 12 small oysters with the first temperature setting at 32 degrees C. I checked on the oysters every ~15 minutes.
9:38 am: None of the shells opened. I thought at first that an oyster was opening but it was just different looking because it was two stuck together.
9:53 am: All of the oysters remain closed. I took a picture of all of the oysters at this time when they were at 32 degrees. I then turned the temperature up to 42 degrees as instructed.
10:08 am: When I checked on the oysters, the temperature was at 38 degrees, so it was still building up to 42. I opened the lid and picked up one tray of the big oysters and then picked up the tray with the little ones to see if there was anything changing. Nothing seemed any different.
10:23 am: I picked up the little tray to see the small oysters better. Before I opened the incubator, it was at 41 degrees. Everything continued to look the same.
10:38 am: The temperature was at 41.6 degrees, so I decided not to open the incubator so the temperature would not decrease from being exposed to the room temperature air. There were no open oysters.
11:00 am: No observed difference in the oysters. Three of the small oysters were removed to do respirometry. The check in times are a little offset since I did a safety briefing in between.
11:10 am: Still no change.
11:25 am: The temperature is at a constant 42 degrees and there is no obvious changes. I do not have much knowledge of oysters, so I found some primary literature to read about oysters and the plasticity of their HSPs (https://go.gale.com/ps/i.dop=AONE&u=wash_main&id=GALE%7CA110809314&v=2.1&it=r&aty=ip)
11:40 am: No observed changes.
11:55 am: No observed changes.
12:10 pm: No observed changes.
12:50 pm: No observed changes.
1:00 pm: Zoom with Grace to discuss MUSP data entry methods for me to complete remotely.
1:20 pm: No observed changes. I labeled the tray with purple tape with the start time and date.
2:10 pm: No observed changes besides the fact that someone added an additional tray of oysters.
2:45 pm: No observed changes.
Roberts Lab 