Alumni Highlight: Krista Smilek

Krista Smilek, Former Student and Staff of Forfar Field Station

Krista and her Husband DAn when they were interns at Forfar

When did you first visit Forfar Field Station?

I first visited Forfar on a 2 week course in December 2002 - January 2003 with Ohio University during my senior year of college.

How did your student visit impact your career plans?

I was a biology major with a concentration in marine science and was really excited to be there knowing IFS hired recent college grads at the time. I spent my trip talking with current staff about how to get hired as an intern and hearing about their experiences at Forfar.

What was the most memorable experience as a student?

It was my first time in The Bahamas and I absolutely loved it! I especially loved the people I met, the local staff, and had lots of favorites throughout the trip. My memories from being a student and staff sometimes merge together but I remember the boat trips were the big highlight during my first trip.

What advice would you give to students who are about to visit Forfar?

I would say to have an open mind about everything. Go into this experience knowing you’ll have new experiences you have never had before and they may challenge your thinking. Especially, take in everything during the visit to Red Bays.

What was your experience like during your internship year at Forfar?

top row L-R: Ryan, Lodi, Jeremey, Shannon, Joann, Catherine

Bottom Row L-R: Local staff, Krista, Rivean, Bubba

I visited during my Spring Break for the “Applicant Week” where they tested our skills and interviewed us for the position. I then received a week of training in Nelsonville, Ohio at Hocking College before driving down to Florida with all the other interns. I loved my year on staff, especially anything with the boats and all the SCUBA diving. I had my Open Water certification when I started and earned my Dive Master while there. I loved diving at Rat Cay, sitting out on the veranda at night, and everything I learned living on Andros for a year. I still think about it a lot; I miss island time and would love to retire on Andros.

We had a few rare weeks where there were 160+ people at the station, at Shelia’s and elsewhere, and that experience taught me a lot. We would meet as a staff every morning and troubleshoot how to make each day work, then I would take the boat out with students and we always had a fantastic time. Most weeks were more calm with a group or two but even then I still learned skills I keep with me today.

How did your internship at Forfar influence your future career path?

Forfar helped me get into graduate school and helped me land my current job. I earned my Master’s in geology and now work as the Academic Director in the Department of Geology at University of Cincinnati in Ohio. In my interview, the department head saw my Forfar experience on my resume and asked about my ability to lead students on field studies. They also inquired about my lecture experience from Forfar. Those experiences helped me land cool perks in my current job of leading field trips every other year and teaching an annual summer course on natural hazards.

You mentioned meeting your husband at Forfar when you were both interns, could you share more about your story?

Dan and I officially met during training week before our intern year. Once we got to the island, we kept getting to know each other. It was interesting dating and working together but funny because we always requested to work different assignments so we could have space. As our time was coming to a close we started thinking “what happens next?” and ended up living together in Ohio. I was back at OU getting my Master’s while he finished undergrad. I defended my thesis, got a job at the University of Cincinnati, we moved to Cincy and the rest is history. We’ve been here 11 years now and have an 8 year old daughter, Samantha. Ideally, we will eventually live somewhere on the water again but for now we are avid travelers and spend lots of time camping.

When did you last visit Forfar?

I was able to return to Forfar for an Alumni Week during July 2016! It was amazing to see some of the local staff I worked with who are still there. It was nice realizing the charm and feel of Forfar has stayed the same over all these years. I hope to return with a student group in the future!

What else do you want to share about your time at Forfar?

I think the big thing is I loved it, still love it, and think about it a lot. One of my favorite things was waking up early and drinking coffee on the beach watching the sunrise. The sun bleached hair, the slow speed of life…man it was the life!

Alumni Highlight: Sarah Covington, Hoover HS

Sarah Covington, Group Leader

Sarah on an early morning dive at Forfar!

How long have you been bringing students to Forfar Field Station?

I first visited Forfar my second year of teaching in the 2002-2003 school year. When I started teaching, I taught biology/marine biology and now I teach mainly biomedical sciences at Hoover High School in North Canton, Ohio.

What has it been like seeing the changes at Forfar over time?

Visiting every year allows you to see the island and people change, like how we visited before and after the roads were paved. I’ve seen BAMSI start up and watched as the staff members grow up, such as Randal who was about two years old when I started coming.  

Every once in a while, we’d come down and one of our former students was an intern. I think we’ve had three or four former students who returned to intern on the island. Some of them were just like, “I’ll be back”. Some of the kids just take the class because taking a marine biology course is so exciting, especially when it culminates in a trip to Andros. But the kids who are actually interested in marine biology as a career, those are the ones that end up coming back. And obviously there has been lots of change with the grounds and the buildings, like the trees and landscaping, since it can all look completely different after a hurricane.

Have you been staying in one of our newly renovated cabins?

I have and it’s amazing! It’s so nice. Before I came to Forfar for the first time, the teachers who trained me, they used to camp on the little beach just North when they visited.  They would hang their shower bags up to heat up during the day so they could shower at night. So I was expecting it to be very rustic my first time and then when I came down it was like, oh there’s showers and this is nice.  Over the years they’ve fixed up roofs, the grounds, and now the cabins look amazing. We’re really happy with the upgrades.

Did you get to spend some time with Ben Bohl over the years?

Oh yeah! Back in the day, an IFS staff member would always meet us in Fort Lauderdale where we would spend the night before flying over to Andros the next morning. Some years Ben would pick us up and take us to the airport. He would always make sure to get donuts and have us fly donuts over for the staff. Other times, Ben would be here on island. Then, as his health deteriorated, we saw less and less and less of him. But he was pretty much who we talked to on the phone to organize each trip for the first several years.

I’ve always appreciated that the Bahamians were included in the staff and that our day trips include meeting locals. I think that’s probably what our students bring up the most in their journals; sitting and talking to the locals like Terpy, Virmeno, and Maryanne and a lot of their entries were about Daddy Cool and what he was saying. For a lot of our students it’s their first time on a plane and first time out of the country. It allows them to meet people who don’t have the same kind of material stuff they have at home but are so happy, generous, and welcoming. Like Otis, who always has a handful of fruit for whoever visits. I think the cultural aspect of it probably had a lot to do with how Archie and Ben respected the locals.

What did your group enjoyed most this year at Forfar?

This might be my favorite year of all my trips. It’s such a nice mix of educational staff and we only had 20 kids. Sometimes we bring 38 kids and it’s just a lot of bodies in the water at the same time. They were really impressed with the main reef, it looked really good this year. I saw a lot of live coral and it was very fishy out there today, so very good. I think the students saw everything at its best which is nice. They really liked the interns and of course loved the Red Bays trip. They thought everything they saw snorkelling was huge. They have no reference so to them a hogfish the size of a plate is huge, but we’ve seen hogfish out there the size of small ponies. The students just loved everything, especially the blue holes.

Sarah and her students from their recent February 2020 Trip to Forfar.

Is it a rewarding experience for you to come to Forfar?

Definitely, it is. It’s a lot of work planning a trip like this. But this week was just so relaxing. The staff were just so safety-first, extremely helpful, and everything in all the cabins works. It was just nice; it was the perfect week. It’s rewarding and I love that IFS has programming for the local Bahamians. It’s such a neat educational experience for the kids. I think over the years, a lot of the students have become more conservation minded as well, so they’re starting to think about some of the choices they make and how it effects the oceans. In our last class before visiting Forfar, we had a speaker giving a coral lecture talking about coral propagation. So then the students came down and were all really excited hearing about the Forfar coral propagation. I think it really is life changing for the students, even if it’s small things, those small things add up, and you get to say that you were a part of that and it’s a good feeling.

What have been your favorite memories at Forfar over the years?

It was always my birthday so I think my 27th through 35th birthdays were probably always spent on the island. Everyone would always let me pick an adventure.  Another favorite is the memories I made with the people here. One year we visited earlier than usually and I heard Maryanne say, “oh, you’re early this week,” like she knows our group and she knows the adults. Or Otis, he’ll look around at our group and say, “Where’s Sarah? Oh, there’s Sarah!” And that’s crazy since he only sees me once a year for 15 minutes and there he is asking for me by name. The kind of relationship that has formed between people who visit Forfar and the different Androsians on the island, it’s just a beautiful thing to see those relationships. That, and probably the first time I saw a reef shark in the ocean. The first time I saw a hogfish, I almost lost my mind. It was the size of a child and it’s so cool to be able to identify them after learning from a book. It’s neat to see how things change too. It’s nice knowing people care and are putting time, effort, and money into continually improving this place.

Sarah assisting students during a beach clean up on Andros

What does Forfar, overall, mean to you?

I think Forfar epitomises hands on learning because we can sit in front of these kids for seventeen, 3-hour courses and they’re excited, but it’s nothing compared to when they have their faces in the water the first time, and are like, “I saw a beaugregory!” and they know it because we had them learn it. That excitement wasn’t in the classroom, that excitement was in the field. That’s probably the most meaningful thing as a teacher, to see the learning in action, and see their faces light up when they are able to identify or see something for the very first time.

Coral Propagation at Forfar Field Station: Update, October 2024

Off the shores of Forfar Field Station, efforts are being made to repopulate and diversify the coral populations. Our Forfar Educational team works closely with staff from The Perry Institute for Marine Science and Reef Rescue Network to set up and maintain these coral restoration plots near Forfar. We have had a coral nursery since 2015.

In 2023, we established 5 coral domes at one dive site called “The Pool” which as the coral fragments grow will become an artificial reef. We also set up a plot for continual outplanting at Staniard Reef, where we hope to see improvements in hard coral cover. 

In March of 2020, Reef Rescue Network staff Hayley-Jo Carr joined Forfar Educational Staff on Andros, Bahamas to continue the ongoing coral conservation project with the Forfar Nursey.  A total of 121 coral fragments were successfully outplanted and the 69 remaining fragments in the nursey were maintained to cultivate more growth for future outplanting.

Corals are a marine invertebrate made up of polyps that live in colonies.  Most corals form reefs by growing and expanding their surface area. Over time, single coral heads, or fragments, can build up and expand into expansive reef systems. Here on Andros, we have the third largest fringing-barrier reef in the world. It spans one hundred and ninety miles along the East side of the island. The coral types seen along the reef can vary from large bouldering Brain corals to soft gorgonian Sea Fans, and even branching Staghorn and Elkhorn corals.

The Forfar nursery is a hanging line nursery that is situated on the deeper side of the fringing-barrier reef. Multiple rounds of outplanting have been successfully completed at this site and past attached corals have grown quickly and prolifically.  Two suspended ropes with horizontal fishing lines hold up to seventy pieces of growing branching corals. Staff visit the coral nursery once a month to clean away algae and hard growth, like fire coral. They ensure the corals are growing well and no disease or predator has caused damage to the colony. Recently, the bottom line of growing corals was broken. Forfar Educational staff were able to reattach the line using parachute cord and all the living corals were cleaned and cared for. Any corals that died or dropped off of the line were replaced with new fragments. Thanks to their quick efforts, the coral nursery is back in good health.

After the corals reach a certain size, usually between six months to a year of growth, staff are able to take fragments from the main coral body and plant them on the fringing-barrier reef. Cutting fragments from the suspended corals allows for new, faster growth on the main body of the coral. Corals can reproduce sexually or asexually. They can reproduce with mass spawning events in the water column or a small fragment can extend its growth even when it is not connected to its original colony by reproducing asexually. When fragments are cut away from the main body of the coral, the new fragment becomes its own body and growth will sprout. The original section will also re-sprout new growth.  

Using non-toxic marine epoxy, Forfar Educational Staff then transfer the cut fragments and attach them to holes in the cleaned substrate of the outplanting site. Once the marine epoxy hardens, it holds the corals in place until they grow enough to hold themselves to the substrate. Over time, the new coral will reproduce and aid in repopulating the reef by diversifying the genetic variations in branching coral species.

Currently, the Forfar nursery has 69 total growing corals; 56 are Acropora cervicornis (staghorn), 11 are Acropora palmata (elkhorn), and 2 are Acropora prolifera (fused staghorn). Of the three species, Staghorn and Elkhorn are critically endangered, thus most of the growing space is devoted to those species. Branching corals like Fused Staghorn are becoming endangered as well. Branching corals are fast growing, but relatively brittle corals. They are also more susceptible to bleaching events due to rising water temperatures and ocean acidification.

Forfar Educational Staff will continue to clean and maintain the good health of the nursery and hope to outplant more coral fragments in April 2020. To learn more about what you can do to help protect and preserve corals, please visit oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/thingsyoucando.html.

Written by: Haleigh Collins, Forfar Educational Staff

Staff Highlight: A conversation with Ricardo Riley

Ricardo “Cardo” Riley, Facilities Director

How long have you been working at Forfar?
Thirty-two years, full time working. I was a Divemaster, and then took care of the facilities and then did all of the mechanic work on the cars, did all of the mechanic work on the boats, because we didn’t have the Mennonites at the time.

Did you grow up in this area when you were little?
Yeah, I grew up about half a mile from Forfar Field Station.

Did any of your family work here before you started working here?
My dad worked here when Archie built the place. My dad knew Archie, they were great friends. Archie gave us a lot of pictures of himself, we have Archie with slit shells, we have Archie holding me as a boy and my sister. And then my uncle, he worked with Archie too, and Archie give him a piece of Forfar property when he got married, where the Pink House is. It’s a little house right here off on the end of the property.  It’s still there. 

How did your role at Forfar come to change and progress over time?
I used to work in Nassau and I came here because I grew up mostly with my grandmother, not with my mother. When we went to Nassau, I would go and live with my Grammy because she always loved me more than all of the other grandkids, over all, and they all know that (laughing). She has close to 30 grandchildren. She taught me a lot; she was sweet. And when I came here [to Andros], they didn’t know me, no one really know me that much because I would only be here in the summer time. And then Rick Perkins was working here and we became really good friends and he said ‘hey, Ben wants you to work here. Do you want a job?’ and I said ‘do I want a job? I wanna go to the States. Well, what am I going to do?’ and they said ‘you are going to do grounds keeping.’ So I did grounds keeping for one week. So I came in and they saw my potential.  I could fix a boat engine very good at this time and they saw that and they said to me, ‘you’re not supposed to be raking the yard, you want to do diving?’ and I said ‘yeah.’ And I was 18. Ben told him that he wanted me to be the Divemaster, so he says that he’s going to train me a little tough.  The dive instructor after training me said ‘he would be the perfect Divemaster, he doesn’t panic, he just smiles when you turn his air off, you take his mask off and put it on the ground, he still finds it. He would definitely be a good Divemaster.’ The Divemaster course took I was taught by Jim Conkel, he was from Ohio, and he dived with Archie, and Ben would have him come down and he would teach diving, and he was very good.

Archie must have died when you were very young, but do you have any memories of him?

When Archie passed away, I was around three or four, so I don’t have any memories [of him], just photos. 

What about Ben Bohl? I’m sure you have a lot more memories of Ben.
Yeah, I have a lot of memories, we did a lot of road trips together, we did a lot of trips flying together, back and forth from the island to Florida and it was great. I know Ben really well, I stayed with his parents [in the States] for weeks on top of weeks. We were close. He was close with a lot of Bahamians, but I consider myself being the closest to Ben, and I think Elthymae and Susan, they would tell you that. When it was time for Ben to talk to someone, he tells me come over to Florida, and I would go over there and we would talk for weeks when things were not going good up there in the office.

When did you last see Ben? What kind of character was he?
The last time I saw Ben was 2014. Everybody likes him and he had a heart, that when it comes to people, he had a heart that no one really had. Anyone who would come here to Forfar, he would go and take out the whole pan of brownies, any kids, and he would just give, and if someone would pass and say they hungry, he would say ‘go in the pantry, take food.’ His heart, I haven’t seen anyone else like that. He liked to help people, loved to help people. He would throw big Thanksgiving feast, big Christmas feast. He loved helping people, anyone could tell, he loved helping people along the way. 

Did you think from what you have heard about Archie that there are any similarities between Ben and Archie?
Yeah. Ben used to bring groups here, because Ben started out in ’70, and he knew Archie and him and Archie would talk. Ben told me a story, he said that Archie pulled him aside, and I don’t know if Archie knew that he was going to die, but Archie pulled Ben aside and said to him ‘listen, this community, Blanket Sound, this is the community that you want to stay in, and I want you, whatever business you do, I want you to do it right here in Blanket Sound, this is the best set of people, the whole island have good people, but this is going to be the easiest spot that you can run this business and this will be the spot where you don’t have a lot of activity and fighting against you, it’s Blanket Sound, and I want you to stay in this area.’ And then he died, Ben says maybe like, 6 to 9 months later. And Archie told him ‘don’t move out of this area’ for the last time he saw him before he died, ‘stay in this area.’ And it happened.

What have been your favorite memories over the years at Forfar?
Flying back and forth in the IFS plane from Andros to Florida and road tripping with Ben. He loved to road trip with me, I liked to road trip with him, it was great. We would go to Utah. Once we left from here, we would go to Atlanta, we would go into Minnesota, we would go up to Denver. He (Ben) used to run Out West Trips.  We had a lot of interns when they would come in, they asked if they could do one of those Out West Trips and he would say ‘yeah’. It was me and Ben and the chaperones and sometimes we would have someone else go along with us. We used to drive vans.

Over your time, you must have met so many people coming down here and working here as well. Do you keep in contact with people that you met along the way?
Yes, I used to keep in contact with a lot of people.  I would go to the States every summer and I would see a lot and some I wouldn’t see but I would call them a lot. I lost contact with them after my first house burned down to the ground. We just finished building it, furnishing it out, everything, didn’t leave a dollar, and it burnt down. And so, I lost it all, my things as well as my contacts.

What does Forfar mean to you?
Forfar means a whole lot to me because I’ve been through a lot of stuff here at Forfar, I’ve been through some good stuff and I’ve been through some very bad stuff. I’ve seen Forfar when it was at its high peak when I first came.  Forfar had so many people coming here, they had this place (the station), and two campsites. Over there (to the North), there was a whole full campsite, and then the campsite over there (to the south) was always full. We would have sometimes 180 people between the three spots, and I’ve been through all of that, and worked through all of that. And Forfar means a whole lot (to me). I would love to see Forfar the whole way Lindsey is taking it, pick it up, and be around for a long time. I have a lot of nice memories here.

Where are they now? A Spotlight on our Previous Interns: Mike England!

This week we’re catching up with a familiar face to see where life has taken him after his time at Forfar Field Station. Meet our previous environmental educator and education coordinator, Mike England!

Mike spent over two years working at Forfar from 2017-2019 covering two seasons and helping train two cohorts of educational staff. Since leaving the field station, Mike has returned to his hometown of Denver, CO where he currently works as an Educator at the Denver Aquarium.

“I teach classroom programs to school groups,” Mike told us, “as well as improve current classes and develop new curriculum”. Even in the landlocked state of Colorado, Mike is able to share his passion as a marine educator and teach students about the ocean and coastal ecosystems.

During his time at Forfar, Mike developed his diving skills and progressed all the way to PADI Divemaster level, assisting in Open Water courses, and helping maintain our Coral Propagation Nursery.

Mike not only further developed his teaching skills in and out of the classroom but Forfar also taught him to be more adaptable and to embrace a “go with the flow” attitude. Some of Mike’s favorite memories of Forfar are of the people, including the students, he taught on the station and the local Bahamian staff.

Although Mike is excited to be back in Colorado (and back on the ski slopes), he loves seeing all the updates at Forfar and hopes to make a trip back to visit soon!

We wish Mike the best of luck in all of his future endeavors as a marine educator and hope he has many more SCUBA adventures!

Project Update: Tropicalization of Western Atlantic Seagrass Beds

In April of 2018, IFS partnered with the Smithsonian Marine Station on a National Science Foundation (NSF) funded collaborative research project which examined the tropicalization of Western Atlantic seagrass beds. All field experimentation and collection was completed in June 2019 and the project has now transitioned to sample processing, data entry, and analysis at Florida International University. 

Although still early in the analysis, we are excited to share updates including some interesting trends across the network. From preliminary analysis, the following outcomes have been reported:

As pictured here the Bucktooth Parrotfish was a prominent grazer at the Andros site.

(1) Higher grazing rates on seagrass at lower latitude sites by small-bodied fishes (e.g. Sparisoma radians, Bucktooth Parrotfish).

(2) Grazing rates were found to be highly variable but did increase in treatments with nitrogen and phosphorous and had visible effects on seagrass within experimental plots.

(3) Intensive turtle grazing  observed at experimental sites in Bermuda and Eleuthera, BS. To date, this is the first report of overgrazing by turtles in the Bahamas!

(4) In winter, there was reduced seagrass cover and productivity relative to summer/fall particularly, at more subtropical sites. 

(5) Broad-scale distinctions were observed in seagrass meadow structure (shoot density / leaf morphology) and function (production) across our latitudinal gradient. 

Fig 1. Seasonal and latitudinal variation in sea surface temperatures (°C) across the network. Temperatures across sites were similar during the summer and diverged in October after the fall 2018 sampling.

(6) Latitudinal distinctions are present in how the turtlegrass meadows respond to intense grazing (simulated via clipping). Meadows at the more northern sites displayed more severe responses (decreased leaf width and production) relative to more tropical, lower latitude meadows. 

This suggests that there is lower meadow resilience in northern distribution of turtlegrass, likely attributable to large-scale gradients in climate forcings. This potentially confirms the original hypotheses that broad-scale light/temp gradients across the network regulate meadow responses to intense herbivory.  

The network itself is a huge achievement; as one of the  first major coordinated projects across the Western Atlantic with over 40 individuals working together to deploy, maintain, and break down a large coordinated field experiment. All 13 sites were able to successfully complete the project despite hurricanes, harmful algal blooms, flooding, and cold winter temperatures. This network has led to connections between participants, new opportunities, collaborative projects and a Caribbean-wide Sargassum monitoring network.

This is an exciting first look at the results from a project which is so crucial to investigating the effects of climate change on a foundational marine environment. IFS looks forward to staying engaged with this project so make sure to check back for further updates and publication of results!