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We're now just about three days from our first station in the Ross Sea and we are eagerly anticipating our first samples. The IcyInverts team on NBP25-01 is primarily interested in sampling small macrofauna - animals between 0.5 mm and ~1 cm - that live on top of soft sediments or are burrowed within the first couple centimeters of the sediment. The instrument we use to sample these organisms is called an epibenthic sledge (AKA epibenthic sled or EBS). The particular instrument owned by the USAP is the Aquatic Biotechnology Epibenthic Sledge. The EBS is designed to be towed from a ship while it glides over the surface of a soft, non-rocky seabed. The instrument has two 500 µm mesh nets, one on top of the other, that collect animals as the sediment surface is disturbed by the wire pulling the sledge behind the ship. A lever on the bottom of the instrument keeps a pair of doors covering the openings of the nets closed whenever it is not on the bottom so that it doesn't fill with plankton during its journey down to the bottom or on its way back up to the surface. The EBS also has mounts for an underwater camera and LED lights so its operation can be filmed at depths of up to ~250 meters. This instrument was a new purchase for NBP23-03 and it worked amazingly well! It rather consistently recovered clean samples of small macrofauna that required little sieving back on board to remove remaining sediment. Our team was so pleased with "Blue" as we nicknamed it that USAP purchased a second nearly identical instrument (although the company made some improvements based on feedback on its operation provided by USAP Marine Technician Matt Louis) as a back-up for this and future cruises in case tragedy strikes and we lose the EBS. The vast majority of the animals we will post pictures of during NBP25-01 will be collected with our friend 'Blue.' Kevin Kocot University of Alabama
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