Comparison of the Distribution, Abundance, and Diversity of Zooplankton in Trevor Channel and Alberni Inlet, Barkley Sound, Vancouver Island, Canada

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 444

Circulation patterns and processes in Barkley Sound, Vancouver, BC

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 444

Zooplankton retention in Muchalat Inlet, a fjord basin in Nootka Sound, BC

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 445

Detecting a shallow surface layer in Barkley Sound from Lagrangian drifter trajectories

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 444

Survey of dinoflagellate cysts in Barkley Sound, Vancouver Island, Canada

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 445

Spatial variability in surface sediment organic carbon structure in Barkley Sound, Vancouver Island, Canada

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 445

Do upwelled waters from the California Undercurrent contribute to high pCO2 within the fjord system of Nootka Sound, BC?

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 445

Comparing growth rates of natural phytoplankton communities to laboratory culturing experiments

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 445

Environmental impact assessment: looking at sediments in Nootka Sound for traces of pulp mill effluent

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 445

Dividing population genetic distance data with the software Partitioning Optimization with Restricted Growth Strings (PORGS): an application for Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha), Vancouver Island, British Columbia

A new method of finding the optimal group membership and number of groupings to partition population genetic distance data is presented. The software program Partitioning Optimization with Restricted Growth Strings (PORGS), visits all possible set partitions and deems acceptable partitions to be those that reduce mean intracluster distance. The optimal number of groups is determined with the gap statistic which compares PORGS results with a reference distribution. The PORGS method was validated by a simulated data set with a known distribution. For efficiency, where values of n were larger, restricted growth strings (RGS) were used to bipartition populations during a nested search (bi-PORGS). Bi-PORGS was applied to a set of genetic data from 18 Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) populations from the west coast of Vancouver Island. The optimal grouping of these populations corresponded to four geographic locations: 1) Quatsino Sound, 2) Nootka Sound, 3) Clayoquot +Barkley sounds, and 4) southwest Vancouver Island. However, assignment of populations to groups did not strictly reflect the geographical divisions; fish of Barkley Sound origin that had strayed into the Gold River and close genetic similarity between transferred and donor populations meant groupings crossed geographic boundaries. Overall, stock structure determined by this partitioning method was similar to that determined by the unweighted pair-group method with arithmetic averages (UPGMA), an agglomerative clustering algorithm.

Dinoflagellate cyst-based reconstructions of mid to late Holocene winter sea-surface temperature and productivity from an anoxic fjord in the NE Pacific Ocean

Published contemporary dinoflagellate distributional data from the NE Pacific margin and estuarine environments (n = 136) were re-analyzed using Canonical Correspondence Analysis (CCA) and partial Canonical Correspondence Analysis (pCCA). These analyses illustrated the dominant controls of winter temperature and productivity on the distribution of dinoflagellate cysts in this region. Dinoflagellate cyst-based predictive models for winter temperature and productivity were developed from the contemporary distributional data using the modern analogue technique and applied to subfossil data from two mid to late Holocene (~5500 calendar years before present–present) cores; TUL99B03 and TUL99B11, collected from Effingham Inlet, a 15 km long anoxic fjord located on the southwest coast of Vancouver Island that directly opens to the Pacific Ocean through Barkley Sound. Sedimentation within these basins largely comprises annually deposited laminated couplets, each made up of a winter deposited terrigenous layer and spring to fall deposited diatomaceous layer. The Effingham Inlet dinoflagellate cyst record provides evidence of a mid-Holocene gradual decline in winter SST, ending with the initiation of neoglacial advances in the region by ~3500 cal BP. A reconstructed Late Holocene increase in winter SST was initiated by a weakening of the California Current, which would have resulted in a warmer central gyre and more El Niño-like conditions.

Impacts from aquaculture facilities on intertidal ecosystems using quadrant surveys and antibiotic tracers

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 444

A mechanical design approach to testing fluid turbulence over a rough surface

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 444

Geological structure and acoustic properties of sediments in Effingham Inlet

Thesis written for Oceanography 445

Sources and transport of surface sediment and metals in B.C. fjord, Tahsis Inlet

Senior thesis written for Oceanography 445