After walking on dry land for about two weeks I finally stopped swaying while standing. The post-cruise recovery is no joke. Since spare time, Wi-Fi and sleep are sparse commodities aboard a research vessel we returned with lots to catch up on.
diatoms dominated the spring bloom! 
a dinoflagellate feeding on a Phaeocystis colony
I started processing the microscope slides made at sea. Oh the wonders they display! The photo above shows some of the planktonic community at 10 meters depth near Middleton Island under epifluorescence microscopy. These slides were created onboard the Sikuliaq using approximately 65 ml of filtered seawater collected at each of our study stations. I used numerous filters to screen out both large and very small planktonic organisms in hopes of trapping planktonic cryptophytes on the microscope slide. With these slides I will be able to determine where cryptophyte plankton exist in the Gulf of Alaska and how prevalent they are at each station. Eventually I will have slides from spring, summer and fall research cruises to make seasonal comparisons. If you’ve been keeping up with our blogs thus far you know that cryptophytes are a highly sought-after prey organism worldwide! Understanding the contribution of different organisms to the food web helps us to understand how marine ecosystems function and to evaluate changes that may be occurring due to climate change.
Microzooplankton in the NGA: Laboea strobila ciliate retaining chloroplasts (left) next to a photosynthetic dinoflagellate called Ceratium sp. (right) 
same species as photo on left viewed under epifluorescence microscopy (note yellow ingested chloroplasts)
Preliminary data processing has revealed exciting findings from the 2021 spring cruise! We measured some of the highest chlorophyll concentrations that we’ve ever observed in the Northern Gulf of Alaska spring bloom-up to about 30 micrograms per liter at some locations! We also detected tons of chain diatoms (organisms that look like fancy string in the photos included), and high diversity of other planktonic organisms such as ciliates, dinoflagellates, and cryptophytes.
We will continue to unpack the unique data from this cruise and work to explain how the 2021 spring bloom impacts the health and longevity of this precious ecosystem. Stay tuned for updates from the summer research cruise aboard the Sikuliaq as we return to Alaska next week!
The Planktonic Life 