Intern Account: Malia:
"The water, being the deepest and roughest its ever been, made the wade out to goat island difficult rather than the refreshing walk it usually is. When we reached the island, We set out to set the bait traps for the ants. Unfortunately, we counted wrong and ended up missing one of the flags. Since it was also one of the hottest days we've ever had out there, the honey began to melt as soon as we put it in the plastic bag. During the transect, I surveyed the southern coast of the island and noticed a giant decrease in the number of ants found in that area. I thought that the entire population had decreased further. At the end of the transect, the dead sea bird that we had seen a week earlier was still there, looking exactly the same as it did last week. After the transect, we did the ant survey in plot 1, which is on the northern side of the island. The ant nest that had been there almost four weeks ago was now demolished. We had trouble finding ants at first, but ended up finding about five ants where over one thousand had lived. After about one hour had passed, we set out to pick up the ant bait. I assumed that because I did not see many ants in my transect area, the number of ants in the inside of the island would have decreased. Unfortunately, there are still a multitude of ants in the middle of the island. Especially where grass, leaves, and bushes cover the ground. One good aspect that we noticed was in the dry areas where there were no ants in the first weeks, but ants started to inhabit in weeks three to five, their population had ceased to exist. The dry areas that used to be ant-less were ant-less once again. I hope that the ant bait that had helped rid the coastal areas of ants will eventually get rid of the ants in the middle of the island. This week ultimately showed slow progress in the ant eradication effort."