Today’s the Day! Heading Out Onto the Water
Well, folks, all the prep and planning has led to this moment: our team officially got onto Okanagan Lake to trawl for some microplastics.
This day would not have been possible without the support and assistance of several key groups. Let’s give them a round of applause!
- The Okanagan Nation Alliance, for generously contributing their research vessel, and two staff and their time to assist us with sampling. Without them, this day would not have happened!
- Okanagan College, for assisting with the sampling and connecting us with a possible option for analyzing these samples in the fall (and Erin and her tiny microscope – so fun to watch little zooplankton zip around the jars)
- UBCO and Ryland Giebelhaus, who joined us on this journey, helped us get our sampling protocols aligned, and assisted with preliminary analysis.
- FreshWater Life and Gregg Howald, steering the ship on this project
- Copper Sky Productions and Jan Vozenilek, capturing the events of this project through his lens. The beautiful visuals you see here are all his work!
- Fresh Outlook Foundation and Joanne De Vries, supporting the communications aspect of this project
- And of course, the OBWB whose grant made this all possible.
The day turned out to be perfect, despite the ever-present smoky skies. Calm water, reasonable temperatures, and enthusiastic deckhands. 🙂 Interestingly, we pulled up what we assume to be ash particles along with organic materials. Once the samples were pulled on deck, they were quickly transferred to glass jars and preserved with ethanol. The jars have been transferred to Okanagan College where they will await further analysis!
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