AFS Portland Roundup

Several of our members attended the American Fisheries Society national meeting in Portland Oregon on August 16-20.  We were impressed by the broad range of disciplines, studied species, and professionals attending.  The organizers planned several exciting opportunities for us to socialize with fellow scientists in industry or academia, attend presentations on a diversity of national and international research, and even present our own findings in talk and poster sessions. Here's a summary of our attendees and what we presented:

Posters
Aimee Hoover: Acoustic Tag Attachment Methods for Tracking Hatchling Sea Turtles

Gray Redding: An Otolith Stable Isotope Approach to Evaluate Northwest Atlantic Mackerel Contingent Structure

Presentations
Suzan Shahrestani: Understanding the Spatial Dynamics of Jellyfish in Chesapeake Bay (in the hall titled Population Studies in the Chesapeake Bay)

Cara Simpson: Brevoortia tyrannus Spawning Locations Inferred From Long-Term Ichthyoplankton Data (in the room titled Habitat and Species Interactions)

Hillary Lane: The Impacts of Acidification and Warming on Growth and Metabolism of Juvenile Blue Crab (Callinectes sapidus) from the Patuxent River, Chesapeake Bay (in the room titled Ocean Acidification Effects in Marine Fauna).

Brian Gallagher: Intergenerational Contingent Structure in White Perch (Morone americana) within the Hudson River Estuary (in the room titled Frontiers in Otolith Chemistry: Insights, Advances, and Future Directions).

We split our time at the conference between volunteering in the AV room (which in itself afforded the opportunity to interact with many fisheries people we would have otherwise not met and getting a fast recap of countless presentations), sitting in on talks ranging from environmental outreach, indigenous knowledge systems, species from around the globe, and spatial modeling, among many, many others, watching films at the first annual film festival, or just generally exploring the conference facilities, the grand Oregon Convention Center.  In the main hall, a trade show was set up and several organizations and businesses were advertising their products, their chapters of AFS, or just spreading awareness about key issues.  We received magnets and flashlights from representatives of the 7th annual World Fisheries Congress happening in Korea next year.  A few of us found some old friends at the table with the Alaska Chapter, and we learned a lot about possible post-graduate programs like Ecologists Without Boarders.

But probably the most enticing attraction in the hall was the famed "Salmon Cannon."  Known to fisheries scientists for years as a viable method for transporting migrating salmon over insurmountable dams, the Salmon Cannon, made by Whooshh Innovations in Bellevue, Wash, was popularized by the HBO program "Last Week Tonight with John Oliver" in this segment and has gained almost cult status ever since.

                       

Your humble subunit blogger, Emily Liljestrand. Who didn't present at AFS, but tried to regularly tweet from there.

Living near the center of the Chesapeake Bay, we don't often think about issues of damming and their effects on migrating species (though we are certainly not without).  Being in Portland, in the American Northwest made us confront these issues that are so endemic to the region.  Holding the event in this location also let us explore the splendor of the city and the region.  We had several opportunities to taste the exotic, artisan, and experimental food Portland had to offer.  Thai restaurants, Vietnamese restaurants, and even several Vegan options were all made available.  As Aimee said "everyone can find their own favorite spots in Portland, because all people and views are represented."  Or arguably more importantly, Brian pointed out "Portland has tons of breweries (58 in the city!) as well as the best public transit system."  On the second to last night of the conference, the organizers hosted a lovely social event downtown, with our name up in lights!

           
                                       
At some point in the trip, all of us made our way up north, to the Bonneville Dam to be exact.  There, we got to see migration in action, watching fish traverse the expertly placed fish ladder, designed to guide in their upstream swim (thought not nearly as dramatic as a CANNON!)  In the nearby hatchery, we watched cultivated sturgeon and rainbow trout.  Subsequent trips to Multnomah Falls and the Portland Zoo really rounded out the trip and made for some stellar photos:

                 
                    

So if representatives of AFS are reading this, we'd like to give a resounding thank you for all the hard work that must have gone into organizing such an awesome event. We cannot wait to see what Kansas City, Missouri will bring next year, and even Tampa the year after.