Polychaetes, Polypores, and Pooters

This spring, the wild woods and waters of Quadra Island, British Columbia, were swarming with more than their usual array of species. Starting on April 21, 2024, naturalists, scientists, and curious members of the public gathered for a three-week “bioblitz” hosted by the Hakai Institute and partnering institutions from across North America. The goal: document what lives on Quadra Island, from protists to large mammals. 

A bioblitz is an effort within a designated location to record as many species as possible within a designated time period. Globally, bioblitzes are growing in popularity, in part because they are a great way to connect communities to their surrounding environments and to engage them in biodiversity science and conservation. This blitz was no exception. The excitement was palpable as species such as Humboldt squid (Dosidicus gigas), goblin’s gold or luminous moss (Schistostega pennata), and Bering hermit crab (Pagurus beringanus) were found by scientists, students, and others partaking in the intensive event. 

Partners included the Florida Museum of Natural History, the University of British Columbia, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, and the Institute for Comparative Genomics at Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia. 

“Getting a group of experts together for a short-term, high-intensity survey is a great way to better understand the biodiversity of a particular region,” says Hakai Institute research scientist Matt Lemay, who helped coordinate the event. 

“Our previous bioblitzes have identified species that were not previously known to live in British Columbia and have even led to the discovery of new species. There’s a lot we don’t know about biodiversity and these bioblitzes are a great way to fill the gaps in our knowledge.”

Quadra Island is a unique spot. The largest island of the Discovery Islands and the second largest island in the Salish Sea, it is separated from Vancouver Island by Discovery Passage, and from Cortes Island by Read Island and the Sutil Channel. It is characterized by its long beaches, winding trails, remote lakes, and lush parks. Its location at the junction of three ocean influences—the Salish Sea to the south, Johnstone Strait and the Pacific Ocean to the northwest, and Bute Inlet and its icefields to the north— make its terrestrial, coastal, and marine ecosystems highly diverse. 

In other words, the perfect spot for a bioblitz.

Environment aside, the existing relationships between the Hakai Institute and the Quadra Island community also presented a wonderful opportunity for engagement. Bioblitzes can fall within a spectrum, from taxonomy-focused and scientist-driven events to those with public participation at the fore. Most—like this blitz—fall somewhere in between. 

The Hakai Institute’s ecological observatory on Quadra Island, established in 2014, consists of state-of-the-art labs, monitoring sites, meeting houses, and the Quadra Centre for Coastal Dialogue. Institute scientists and staff are embedded in the community, regularly engaging with the local schools, zipping around in dive boats, and grabbing coffee at the local shops. And community members are integral to the Hakai Institute. For example, volunteers from the community regularly participate in Hakai-led projects such as Sentinels of Change, an initiative driven by communities and scientists that is investigating the dynamics and patterns of crab recruitment and biodiversity on the coast. 

These existing relationships between the Hakai Institute and the Quadra Island community meant that the community could be engaged in various ways, including art-science participatory education, guided nature interpretation, presentations, and even informal coffee shop conversations.

To date, scientists and community participants at the 2024 Quadra bioblitz have logged over 12,000 unique observations and identified over 1,500 species on the Hakai Quadra Island Bioblitz’s iNaturalist project page and it is anticipated that upward of 1,000 additional species will be added in the coming months. 

iNaturalist (called “iNat” by fans) is an online platform that allows participants to submit photos of the organisms they are seeing, and to obtain support in species identification from iNaturalist’s computer vision model, along with a community of over one million scientists and naturalists worldwide. Anyone who can use a smartphone or digital camera can contribute. In other words, iNaturalist allows people of any level of expertise to participate, from novice naturalists to species experts. By recording and sharing observations, research-quality data is created for scientists who are working to better understand and protect nature. 

For this blitz, scientists also collected DNA from specimens to add to a global library of DNA called the Barcode of Life Data System. Selectively retained specimens were sent to the Royal BC Museum, the Canadian Museum of Nature, and the Los Angeles Natural History Museum.

Browse the iNaturalist project page to appreciate and learn about some of the creatures that call Quadra Island and its surroundings home, from the commonly observed ochre sea star (Pisaster ochraceus) and Pacific banana slug (Ariolimax columbianus) to the fantastically named frilled dogwinkle (Nucella lamellosa), bristly haircap moss (Polytrichum piliferum), seep monkeyflower (Erythranthe guttata), and dragon horn (Cladonia squamosa), to the rarely observed jellied bird’s nest fungus (Nidula candida) and padded sculpin (Artedius fenestralis). 

Overall, the community seemed thrilled to be a part of the event, as did the invited taxonomists. At Quadra Elementary School, where approximately 45 students in grades three, four, and five (and their teachers) participated in an art-science exploratory activity, the students were particularly enamored with a paralarval and ridiculously cute bobtail squid (Rossia pacifica) that was captured in a light trap set at the Quathiaski Cove dock the night before as part of the blitz and the Sentinels of Change project. 

Students who weren’t admiring the live specimens were encouraged to interpret their observations in “field guides” (booklets of watercolor paper), motivated by what they were seeing and by images of previously photographed plankton scattered across their desks, and limited only by their imaginations. Students were also shown some of the tools used for sampling marine and terrestrial biodiversity,  including the light trap, and the always-popular “pooter”—a small jar used to collect insects via suction by the user. 

The bioblitz wasn’t only about science, though; it also highlighted how natural history investigation can be interdisciplinary. 

“I was on Quadra Island to serve as a beacon of art among the science of the Hakai Institute’s Quadra Bioblitz,” says Mercedes Minck, a graphic designer and muralist with the Hakai Institute. 

“Along with another artist from the Hakai Institute, Romney McPhie, we spent several days puzzling over bizarre creatures and trying to help both children and adults capture them to the best of their abilities using pencils, paints, and collage. The week was a success with people of all ages dipping their toes into the fields of art and science. These two seemingly opposing fields came together over the course of the bioblitz to inspire young and old to see the world through many lenses,” says Minck. 

I think the community engagement side of a bioblitz is just as important as the scientific component. Connecting with community members of all ages creates so many good learning opportunities for everyone involved. On Quadra Island, for example, there are many community members who care deeply about the environment and who have lived on the island for many years and witnessed dramatic changes in local marine ecosystems and species. These events provide a natural way to connect with community members, chat about what we’re seeing out on the water, and what we can do in the face of these changes.

—Carolyn Prentice, Hakai Institute research scientist 

At the Quadra Island Community Centre, members of the public were invited to learn more about the work of the Hakai Institute; some even brought their own art supplies to create unique pieces inspired by reference photos and hands-on, nature-derived materials (shells, bones, plant presses) provided by Hakai Institute staff.

We Wai Kai First Nation guardian team manager Shane Pollard welcomed local “Quadraites” to evening presentations by Hakai Institute scientists and international collaborators. Presentations by taxonomists Brittany Cummings, Henry Choong, and Leslie Harris, on amphipods, hydroids, and polychaete worms, respectively, were thought-provoking and induced laughter and fostered enthusiasm for some of the lesser-known, and often unsung, species with whom we share our coast. Who knew worms could be so beautiful?

“Presenting my research at the Quadra Island Community Centre as part of the Hakai Quadra Island Bioblitz was the highlight of my year,” says Brittany Cummings, a PhD candidate in the Department of Biology, at the Florida Museum of Natural History. “I rarely get to talk about my research outside the academic bubble, so it was super fun to see new faces and talk about my passion for bizarre crustaceans. Plus, free coffee and cookies!” 

Two hands-on events—a subtidal show-and-tell on the grounds of the Heriot Bay Inn and a low-tide walk at Rebecca Spit Marine Provincial Park on the eastern shore of Quadra Island near Heriot Bay—drew community members from Quadra Island as well as visitors from farther afield. At the show-and-tell, cyanotype photography was used to engage participants in an investigation and appreciation of some of the local seaweeds, such as rockweed (Fucus vesiculosus). Beautiful, shadowy cyan-blue cyanotype prints are exposed when objects are placed on paper coated with a solution of iron salts and then exposed to sunlight. 

Species that were the most popular among visitors at the show-and-tell included a heart crab (Phyllolithodes papillosus), a crab characterized by a distinctive heart shape of raised bumps on its triangular shell that is commonly found in rocky, current-swept locations in the shallow subtidal zone, and the ever-popular giant orange peel nudibranch (Tochuina gigantea). This species of sea slug (or marine gastropod mollusk) looks for all the world like a discarded orange peel.

On a low-tide walk one morning, teachers and support staff from a Campbell River elementary school joined scientists to learn more about bioblitzes and the tools used to support them. Within minutes, teachers were using iNat’s junior app Seek to identify plants on land and critters on cobble beaches. Hakai Institute staff Carolyn Prentice and Margot Hessing-Lewis answered questions and got everyone to get their feet wet with a peek at the low-tide zone around Rebecca Spit and the We Wai Kai campground. 

Preserving the environment is ultimately the reason we are scientists. I think that the environment is most often harmed when people are not aware of their surroundings, rather than when people are intentionally destructive. If this is the case, the best way to preserve the environment is through a well-informed public. What better way to introduce people to their surroundings than to get them involved in a local biodiversity survey?

—Brittany Cummings, PhD candidate, Department of Biology, Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida

There was a full house at the Heriot Bay Inn (HBI) for the finale of the “University of Quadra” semester-long seminar series, catering to local residents of Quadra Island and visitors alike. This seminar series is hosted weekly at the HBI, with a fun “graduation party” following completion of the last seminar. 

In concert with the bioblitz, participating scientist Chris Harley—a University of British Columbia zoology professor and longtime Hakai Institute affiliate—delivered a rousing presentation that spanned the history of marine ecology in the Pacific Northwest. Harley’s talk ranged from early work by Bob Paine in Washington State, who determined how top-down control by sea star predators led to greater overall diversity, to more recent work by Harley and Hakai Institute scientists. This research aimed to counter early studies by quantifying all the teeny-tiny organisms associated with the primary prey of sea stars: mussels. 

Harley also showed the crowd pictures of the last big heatwave event that had a devastating effect on intertidal marine life in the Salish Sea. The good news: recovery has been observed in many areas, supporting the high diversity witnessed during the bioblitz. The packed house delivered a round of applause and quickly retired to celebration in the adjacent pub where cheers for natural history and science were heard amid the sound of the Vancouver Canucks’ goals. 

If you’re now thinking that you’d love to host a bioblitz in your community, you’re not alone! A recent study recorded 1,836 iNaturalist bioblitzes globally between 2013 and 2020. Years of collective experience have shown that bioblitzes are effective at bringing people and organizations together to build communities that link professionals and amateurs, connect people to place, and advance the conservation and protection of local biodiversity. The Hakai Institute is proud to have contributed, through this event, to the global community of bioblitzers working to document the amazing diversity of life on Earth, and to have contributed to the wonderful Quadra community of which the institute is a part.

For more information on the Hakai Quadra Island Bioblitz, read this article published in Tula’s first quarterly publication and this article recently published by Canada’s National Observer. This article published in Hakai Magazine in 2023 gives more details on the importance and excitement of bioblitzes.