November 29, 2007
UW biologists lead natural history lessons on squid
“Don’t poke the ink sack.”
“Whoa, eggs. Now we know it’s a female.”
“Ours is too young to have babies — and it’s also too young to drink, smoke or drive a car.”
So ran the comments from Bellevue middle school science students from the Eton School as they learned about squid anatomy while dissecting specimens Nov. 16 on the UW campus.
Sponsored by the Fisheries Acoustic Lab of the UW School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences and the Burke Museum, the 38 students toured the exhibit, In Search of Giant Squid, which is at the Burke through Dec. 31, and speculated on how they’d launch a research expedition to find a giant squid.
The fisheries biologists helping the students included some who had been on a recent expedition near Dutch Harbor, Alaska, where they used acoustic instruments to try to discern squid from other aquatic organisms, according to John Horne, a research associate professor of aquating and fisheries sciences. The cruise was led by UW research associate Sandra Parker-Stetter with help from research associate Cairistiona Anderson and research scientist/engineer David Barbee, who were at the Burke to lead activities as part of the squid program.
It’s difficult to know how abundant squid are in the Bering Sea because they are short-lived and hard to track, Horne says. In the past their numbers have been estimated based on how many squid show up as bycatch in the nets of boats fishing for walleye pollock. In work funded by the North Pacific Research Board, Horne’s group is trying to find a better way to identify and estimate the number of squid.
