Oceans Live '97 Q&A with South Caicos

  From the week ending April 4, 1997

What are the dorms like? Are they comfortable?...John J., Duluth, Minnesota, USA
by Heather Ross, 3/30/97, South Caicos Island

The dorms here are divided into two wings, the east and the west. Each wing has two rooms for men and two for women. There are either three or four people in each room, and we all sleep in bunk beds. Luckily, each room has its own bathroom, or there would be lots of arguments! Many of the rooms have murals which former students have painted. My bathroom door has dolphins dancing in the surf painted on it. The windows (which save us from the heat by letting the breeze in) are large boards which we prop open with sticks. Sometimes during heavy winds or rainstorms, the sticks will fall out and the board will bang against the wall and make lots of noise. There are low walls right outside our rooms where we sit, talk, and watch the sunset and the waves. Our rooms are pretty nice and we even have pet cockroaches. We are going to name them!

What is the most satisfying thing you have accomplished so far on South Caicos Island? ...NS, Trenton, New Jersey, USA
by Peter Scholze, 3/28/97, South Caicos Island

 The most satisfying thing that I have accomplished on South Caicos Island is working with my classmates to construct a pair of juvenile lobster collectors. Last week, as part of our studies, we constructed the two collectors using hollow plastic tubing, hog’s hair (a fine mesh wool), ropes, and buoys. These collectors are essentially homemade filters used to collect small aquatic organisms.

In our resource management class we have been studying various methods for determining the lobster population in the waters surrounding the Turks and Caicos Islands. By placing the two collectors in the ocean at dive sites used by our school, and by checking their contents periodically, we hope to gain insight as to the abundance of juvenile lobsters in the area. Construction of these two collectors was labor-intensive, but by working as a member of a group, the project was completed successfully, thereby giving me a very satisfied feeling.

www.sitesalive.com / Oceans Live