On the boat, on the Neuse River, Wesley Clapp is prepared for a 10-hour day of research.
			Discovering an Ecosystem through Dolphins By Adam Kowit
	Clapp took his turn steering the boat.		MARCH 23, 2000--The Neuse River is so wide you can't see across it except on a clear day. A 472-square-kilometer finger of water opening out into Pamlico Sound and then the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Beaufort, North Carolina, the river is also a feeding and frolicking site of a species of bottlenose wild dolphin. Over the past two years, the dolphins have abandoned the river's deep middle to swim along the shallow sides because pollution has made the deep water too salty to support the fish on which the dolphins subsist. "Bottlenose dolphins structure their behavior according to their environment. If a certain fish they love to eat and is found only on the sides of the river, the dolphins will go there too," says Wesley Clapp, a senior from Sudbury, Massachusetts.This past summer, Clapp, along with Shabeen Ally, a student at Smith College, joined a research team studying dolphin behavior led by Damon Gannon, a Ph.D. candidate at Duke University's marine lab. Gannon's team studies dolphin behavior with respect to the environment, not only to discover how bottlenoses adapt to their conditions, but also to better understand the whole river's changing ecosystem. "We'd get on a seven-meter outboard-powered boat for 10 to 11 hours a day, three times a week, to follow dolphins," says Clapp. When Clapp's team sighted a group, they would isolate one easily identifiable dolphin--the focal animal--to follow, periodically recording its activities and the corresponding environmental conditions. Each recording was a data point. "We'd record the dolphins' social behavior, feeding, and traveling patterns," Clapp says. If the phrase social behavior conjures up images of Sea World, Clapp says that's not too far off the mark. "They definitely do flashy things. Once, just at sunset, three leaped out of the water together. It was unbelievable." Taking data points was often frustrating, says Clapp, because for accuracy the team could only record an event that they were absolutely certain had happened. "The water was dark and you couldn't tell if the dolphins had been socializing underneath the water." Similarly, "feeding counted only when we saw fish in the mouth. It's rare to see that above water, especially during the two minutes we looked." The research team had five people, with four going out in a day. "We shared responsibilities completely," says Clapp. Tasks included running the fish-gathering trawl, analyzing the water for salinity and oxygen concentration, recording dolphin behavior by looking through binoculars, and taking pictures ("we had to drive up real close but not so close as to affect their behavior"), and, finally, driving the boat and navigating what Clapp calls the "oh-so-easy-to-lose-your-sense-of-direction Neuse River." The team will use its results in ongoing efforts to persuade the Environmental Protection Agency to establish regulations for river pollution, especially nitrogen waste dumped from nearby hog farms. "They're pushing the [dolphin] environment out of the river," Clapp says. We're trying to prove the environment is moving to the sides." Beyond the pure joy of working with dolphins, says Clapp, "What I really liked about experience was being out in the field for so long. Ten to 11 hours a day in the hot sun is better than in the lab under a microscope." Out on the boat, he and the other scientists "talked a lot," he says. "Even the labs had a casual atmosphere." When Clapp wasn't out on the river, he and Ally sat in on a Duke marine-mammals class taught by Andrew Read, assistant professor in the practice of marine conservation ecology. (Read is "the top marine mammal researcher in the world," according to Clapp.) "I know I want to stay in science," says Clapp, "but I also want personal interaction. This summer showed me that research can have a fun aspect to it. I met so many amazing people."
			Shabeen Ally, a student at Smith College, was the other undergraduate researcher with Clapp.
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