The Science of Monster Soup

Several weeks ago my nephew, upon hearing about my upcoming adventures in Honduras, exclaimed to his mother, "Oh! Oh no that is way too scary! I'm scared of the ocean! There are monsters! It's monster soup!" Recently, when I messaged my sister the silly snorkeling selfie you see below, she showed it to her son, who gasped, "Oh that is cool! She is so brave! She is IN the monster soup!"

Homo sapiens sapiens (The Scariest Monster in the Soup)

I've been so busy, and learned much in a short period of time. It's hard to really quantify everything I have experience and gotten out of this adventure. There have been hardships, but also immense joy and renewal of a sense of wonder and purpose... but I can save those thoughts for my final blog post when we leave this place.

Today was a day of crunching data, and learning about the pitfalls of field science. My data made beautiful graphs, yet I could see nothing but holes to punch through all of my hard work on octopus predation preferences - not the least of which, was learning that even using the word "preference" in my research was opening up a can of worms that I should avoid at all costs.

How do you answer questions you aren't allowed to ask? How can you draw conclusions when the data you gathered out in the field was not what you expected or needed to find?

Thanks to my professors, and the incredible, one-on-one tutelage I am getting in this smallest of class sizes, I learned my biggest lessons of field work. The first, is to be as prepared beforehand as much as you can be. This can best be achieved by reading up on everything you can about your subjects, and by having the tools and resources needed to find what you are looking for. Animals in the field can't be conveniently ordered and placed into tanks for observation and easy manipulation. What you find out there is never going to be what you expect, or want. It's never easy. Nature doesn't give up Her secrets without extracting a cost.

Still, what data I have gathered can be added to the font of human knowledge, however flawed and incomplete I deem it to be. My hope is that I can come back next year, and build on what I have learned. There is so much to be explored in this remote place, and I want to come equipped to explore it properly.