Mermaids and Microscopes: Trials and Tribulations (a.k.a. remote field work)

Well I said I would be better, and I failed. I went through my entire field work session in Belize without blogging once! The remoteness and slowness of internet of Carrie Bow Caye, Belize was totally underestimated and frankly nothing would upload. So close your eyes and imagine we are back in time by about three weeks. And we will pretend I am back on the island.

Each year as I plan and pack for field work I somehow expect that I now have it all figured out. This year will be different. I will hit the ground running and know exactly what I am doing every second of the season. Then the work begins, I shake my head, and I laugh at my naivety. However, when I start to get frustrated at myself I remember (or my boss kindly reminds me) that if it wasn't hard and didn't go wrong, I'm not doing anything novel or worthwhile. And after a few minutes of questioning if I've made major errors in choosing my career, I shake it off and get to work. I mean I get to work places like this:

See that island that looks as if it's floating mid air? That's Carrie Bow

So this year was no different. I planned on collecting lionfish, easily scraping their mucus layer off, and I would come back to our home lab and analyze the mucus for antimicrobial compounds. Every paper I read made it sounds so easy. Every fish expert I talk with made it sound so easy, "just scrape the mucus off." Not considering for a second that I work with a fish that has 17 venomous spines! That I collect while scuba diving. That I have to spear and promptly pith (sever the spinal cord with an aluminum spike). And that the fish is bleeding everywhere. "Oh just scrape it off" they say, "it's easy" they say.

After the first day of collections, it became painfully aware that after that assault the lionfish were not going to give me their mucus readily. I wish I would have taken pictures of what happened next, because I'm sure to everyone else it would be hilarious. But to me at the time, I was not amused. At one point we had the fish strung up and dangling from PVC while trying to collect the drippings in a beaker sitting below (note: this did NOT work). Well, we finally figured it out and I was able to collect the lionfish mucus but here's the lesson I have learned from my 4 years of conducting field research. It takes about 5% intellect, 5% preparation, 15% shamelessly trolling research articles for alternative methods, 75% being too stubborn to admit defeat. So most days I feel like this guy: