TOM ZELLER, JR.
Dr. Jeffrey Runge of the
University of Maine deploys
“bongo” nets in Maine’s
Damariscotta River Estuary in a
hunt for Calanus specimens.
GROPING FOR ANSWERS
The chilly waters of the Damariscotta River Estuary mingle with Atlantic Ocean currents about midway up
Maine’s coast, roughly 60 miles north
of Portland. About four miles from the
estuary’s mouth, aboard the research
vessel Ira C., Jeffrey Runge, a marine scientist with the University of Maine and
the independent Gulf of Maine Research
Institute, grabs hold of a pair of shallow
plastic drums, yoked side-by-side like
giant bongos, as they are heaved out of
the water by an overhead winch. Each
drum is about two feet in circumference and open at one end. On the other,
they are skirted with fine mesh nets
that taper over several feet into a pair of
narrow steel collection cylinders, each
about the size of a loaf of bread.
Dragging the apparatus behind the boat
for several minutes has drawn an aquarium of minuscule creatures into the cylinders, including a species of rice-sized
zooplankton that can be seen darting and
swimming, like so many sea monkeys, in
the collection jars where they eventually end up. This breed of zooplankton is
technically known as Calanus finmarchicus, Runge says as he raises a jar to his
eyeball, and it carries a staggering payload of rich, fatty acids known as lipids.
This makes it a crucial source of nutrition for, among myriad other creatures,
foraging species like herring and mackerel
— which, as it happens, are among the
many food sources for predatory species
further up the food chain, including Gulf
of Maine groundfish like cod.