Helpful Links

Catalina Island Leadership Program

Phoenix Country Day School

Kelp Forest Information Links

Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuaries

Introduction:
On the 8th grade class trip we visited Howland’s Landing on Catalina Island. We visited it from October 16th-20th. At Howland’s Landing, we learned how to compost, identify different fish, snorkel, kayaked, how to make the earth cleaner, and how to not waste water. When my CELP group went kayaking to Emerald Bay my partner and I had the job of counting how many Garibaldi there were in Emerald Bay. At the end of the day, we counted 116 Garibaldi!
Research:
The question my partner, Hailey and I were answering was, “ How does the population of the Garibaldi change around the region?’ Our methods of collecting this data was kayaking, snorkeling, GPS System, measuring tape that measures the depth, and counting in our minds. When we kayaked, we measured the depth of the water. When we snorkeled, we counted the amount of Garibaldi in the area and took GPS points of sights we spotted them. We also used Benthic Habitat layer to see the depth and used a temperature layer to see the temperature of Catalina Island. We also took pictures of the garibaldi with an underwater camera.
Conclusion:
In our research, we discovered that the shallower, colder water, and more kelp there is in the region, the more Garibaldi will be found. One difficulty that we faced was finding certain layers on MyWorld. It’s also hard to work with a partner with one computer because we both got confused on how to create layers and we messed up a few times. We eventually figured out how to create a layer. If I could build onto this project I would find out the differences between Garibaldi and other fish to how they adapt to abnormal years of temperature. I would advise others to pay attention closely to how many Garibaldi there are in the water. Last piece of advice would be to make sure everything is planned out before starting something. If the climate changes or if were an El Nino year probably some of the Garibaldi would die down because when the water is warmer, kelp dies which means that some of the Garibaldi could be eaten by predators because they aren’t hidden by the kelp or not have enough food. Garibaldi are beautiful and interesting creatures and I recommend studying Garibaldi as an enjoyable project.