This morning we met some of the students from the school who will be helping us out during the week. They are a group of kids from 10th grade (one year away from finishing high school) interested in biology and environmental issues, who also enjoy the outdoors. Today we had Camila, Andrea and Javier with us.
After meeting and giving a short overview of the project and activities of this week, we headed to Cienaga Mallorquin. This is a deltaic lagoon located a few kilometres away from Barranquilla and the school. The lagoon has been highly impacted by urbanisation and other human activities in the Delta.
Once on the water we explained the principles of coring and collecting sediment columns. Andrea and Camila were surprised by how smooth the sediments were. And Javier was really keen to get the coring rig into the ground and digging more soils up. To our palaeo readers, do not worry! the tubes are not being bent in the picture below… it’s an effect of the camera’s wide angle
Even though the weather started to look a bit threatening, we managed to core in two spots of the lagoon and the longest core was 2.5 meters. That one was collected a few meters from the mangrove edge. Alex, our cameraman (left picture), captured all of the action. He is the man in charge of recording our work and interaction with the students so we can produce a short science dissemination video once we are back in Europe. In the picture on the right you can see the contrast between the mangrove forests and the skyline of Barranquilla in the background.
We thought it would be cool to have a drone capturing images from above. Javier, one of the students, is a skilled drone fanatic. He brought his drone and managed to get some really spectacular footage of the work in the boat and the mangrove forest from above.
Around 2 pm our coring rig didn’t want to go any deeper. At the same time the clouds were also suggesting it was time to go home. When it rains in Barranquilla, it really rains! Run off on the streets can be so large that it looks like streets become streams.
Fruit of the day
One of the most enjoyable things about visiting Colombia is the food, specially the fruits. Being a tropical country with lots of topography, Colombia has a diversity of climates and a large variety of produce including fruit you may have never seen. Every day we will be trying to taste a different fruit and will be posting a “fruit of the day” picture.
Today, the spotlight is for Mamon, also called Mamoncillo in other parts of the country
Today, the spotlight is for Mamon, also called Mamoncillo in other parts of the country