The Power of Adaptability: Oyster Research at PRI in a Covid-19 World
A completed washed oyster sample from the HOBS project. Photograph by Jaleigh Pier.
by Jaleigh Pier and Gregory Dietl
In early June, 2020, New York State allowed work offices to reopen under strict Phase II re-opening guidelines. As you might imagine, going back to work in a Covid-19 world is dramatically different than before the outbreak. The day starts with taking your temperature when you walk in the door (or preferably at home before you arrive), filling out a daily health questionnaire, and signing into the visitor logbook with time of arrival. A mask must be worn at all times (unless in an enclosed personal office space), social distancing guidelines limit occupancy of common spaces, and commonly touched surfaces are sanitized regularly.
Even though the Covid-19 pandemic has changed how we work, the Historical Oyster Body Size (HOBS) project in PRI’s labs was able to get back up and running. Since 2018, researchers at PRI have collaborated with the Florida Office of Resilience and Coastal Protection on the HOBS project. The HOBS project is an ongoing effort to assess changes in body size of the ecologically and economically important Eastern Oyster, Crassostrea virginica in Florida. Body size is an important indicator for assessing oyster population condition and restoration success. Because many oyster monitoring programs in Florida only began collecting data within the last couple decades, the HOBS project is helping to fill an information gap in long-term data that can be used to make informed conservation decisions.
Dead buried shells (called a death assemblage) offer the only opportunity to gather location-specific historical baseline data on oyster size from decades to centuries in the past in the absence of historical monitoring records. Digging deeper down into a reef, the further back in time one can travel.
Left: Collecting an oyster reef death assemblage sample. Right: Bagging a HOBS sample. Source: Florida Department of Environmental Protection.
In 2018, more than 200 death assemblage samples were collected from 36 oyster reefs in 12 locations along the Florida coast. Samples were then brought to PRI and processed to collect body size data. More than 20,000 oyster shells were measured. Due to the success of the initial HOBS project, the Florida Office of Resilience and Coastal Protection initiated a second contract to process another 30 samples, which has been the focus of research in the labs at PRI since reopening following the lockdown.
Research Assistant Matthew Pruden washing an oyster sample for the HOBS project. Photograph by Jaleigh Pier.
Center: Measuring oyster body size. Photograph by Jaleigh Pier.
Like everything else, the HOBS project was not immune to Covid-19’s impact. The labs have been much quieter for this round of sample processing. Volunteers, interns, and work study students who played an integral role in the first HOBS project did not come back at first (largely due to mandatory social distancing and occupancy constraints in the lab workspaces). In the first phase of the HOBS project as many as eight people worked on various sample processing steps in the same week. In contrast, this latest round of sample processing has largely been done by existing project staff who can work independently. The rapid shift to working remotely that occurred during the lockdown also affected how the HOBS project was managed once it started back up. We had to adapt to Zoom meetings as the new norm for communication.
Preparing oyster shells for measuring. Photograph by Jaleigh Pier.
An organized boxed sample. Photograph by Jaleigh Pier
The Covid-19 pandemic also changed the sample processing strategy for the HOBS project. The uncertainty of whether another lockdown might occur forced us to plan for potential scenarios outside of our control. Will there be enough staff to finish the project on schedule? What if a project staff member got sick? What if PRI was forced into lockdown a second time? Applying the lessons that we learned in transitioning to working remotely from home during the lockdown earlier in the year, the workflows used to process the death assemblage samples changed.
During the summer months in New York State, although infections were soaring in many other parts of the country, we found ourselves in a bubble of low infection rates with an anticipated second wave in the fall. To take advantage of this respite we prioritized the washing and boxing of samples, which could then be measured from home by project staff in the event of another lockdown. Familiar routines were tossed out the window. This change in our workflow was a little risky because although progress was being made, samples were not completed for the first several weeks of the project. The good news is that we never had to find out if this workflow experiment was a wise decision. We were lucky. Infection rates in New York State remained low enough for us to continue to work from the lab.
While this latest phase of the HOBS project was not quite the well-oiled machine that the first phase was, we were able to meet our project goals. More than 10,000 additional oyster specimens were measured and shared with the Florida Office of Resilience and Coastal Protection to better understand the condition of Florida’s oyster reef habitats.
In all the lessons learned from navigating the HOBS project this summer, being adaptable was by far the most invaluable. To adapt, we had to question whether the HOBS workflow that had defined our success in the past could continue to define our success in the future. We had to forget about what we once believed to be the “right” way of processing a sample. With Covid-19, chances were, it wouldn’t be. We needed a contingency plan for when Plan A didn’t work. We had to gamble that our experiment with the new workflow would not jeopardize the success of the HOBS project if it failed.
Like the HOBS project, the need for adaptability is important in every facet of life. Whether you want to take the next step in your career, get married, or survive a pandemic, adaptability will be important in getting you there.