Matt Bracken

@brackenlab

Marine biodiversity - - he/him/his

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Matt Bracken@brackenlab· 26d

My “office” this morning, complete w/ *Postelsia*. 🌊🌴💙 #MarineLife #SwelterShelterNSF #Kelp

A quadrat (surveying frame made of PVC and string for counting critters), clipboards, marker cone, and temperature data logger on a rocky intertidal reef, with the sea-palm kelp *Postelsia* in the immediate background.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· 28d

Spotted (😉) in many of our #SwelterShelterNSF intertidal survey plots today: terrestrial visitors - spotted cucumber beetles (*Diabrotica undecimpunctata*). 🪲 #MarineLife?

A spotted cucumber beetle - yellow with black spots - crawls across the rock and encrusting algae in one of our intertidal study plots.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· 28d

Where intertidal rocky reefs are composed of “soft” rock - such as the sedimentary mudstones and sandstones of the Point Arena Formation in Mendocino County, California - sea urchins create circular niches by abrading the substratum. #MarineLife #SwelterShelterNSF 🌊🦑

A bunch of purple urchins (*Strongylocentrotus purpuratus*) in their concave, circular niches, along with one sea anemone (*Anthopleura sola*) taking advantage of an otherwise unoccupied niche. They are surrounded by pink, encrusting coralline algae.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· 29d

CHONK! Any day I spot a *Cryptochiton* is a good day. #MolluskMonday #MolluscMonday #MarineLife #SwelterShelterNSF 🌊🦑

A picture of a gumboot chiton - *Cryptochiton stelleri*, the world’s largest chiton species, whose thick, red-brown skin completely covers its plates (hence, “*Crypto*”) - with my hand for scale. It is bigger than my hand.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jul 10

And here is the amazing map of the rockweed plots, drawn by our 13-yr-old field helper. #PhycologyFriday #MarineLife 🌊🦑

A kid-drawn map of our 20 rockweed plots, illustrated in pencil in a Rite-in-the-Rain notebook. A transect line connects the plots in order.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jul 10

For #PhycologyFriday… Here is our rockweed study site on the north side of Starrigavan Bay near Sitka, Alaska. #MarineLife 🌊🦑

Bedrock boulders covered with seaweed protrude from a gravel beach, with ocean, hills, and overcast skies in the background.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jul 9

Classic tidepool scene. 🌊⭐️ + 🌊🌺 #MarineLife 🦑

A tidepool in Sitka, Alaska, filled with ochre seastars (*Pisaster ochraceus*) and giant green sea anemones (*Anthopleura xanthogrammica*).

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jul 8

🌊🍋 #MarineLife 🌊🦑

A “sea lemon” (family Dorididae) - a bright yellow nudibranch - clings to the low-tide rocks amidst seaweeds and sponges.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jul 7

I spy with my little eye something beginning with the letter C. #MarineLife 🦀🦑🌊

A shore crab on a gravel beach, with shells and bits of seaweed around.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jul 6

Sorting snails… 🐌 🐌🐌 vs. 🐌🐌🐌 vs. ❓❓❓ #MolluskMonday #MolluscMonday #SwelterShelterNSF

Small, herbivorous littorine snails are important species in intertidal habitats, and some species can be pretty tricky to tell apart. The photo is of a survey sheet on an aluminum clipboard on which I’ve placed a bunch of snails that I’m trying to identify. They are in three piles: *Littorina sitkana*, *Littorina scutulata/plena*, & *Littorina* spp. because I’m not sure.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jul 6

Volcano view 🌋👀🛩️

Mt. Rainier seen from a jet en route from SEA to SNA. It is near sunset, and the mountain’s shadow stretches behind it to the east.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jul 5

Here’s one last view of Sitka’s amazing intertidal zone before I head to the airport and back to California. I grew up in a small Alaskan fishing community about 100 miles from here, so the time I spend here for fieldwork always feels like coming home. #SwelterShelterNSF #MarineLife 🌊🦑

View of rocky intertidal reefs covered with mussels (*Mytilus trossulus*), barnacles (*Semibalanus cariosus*), and seaweeds (*Leathesia marina*, *Fucus distichus*, etc.), with calm ocean, forested hills, clouds, and patchy blue sky in the background.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jul 4

Our #SwelterShelterNSF project evaluates habitat-forming foundation species (intertidal rockweeds & mussels) in the context of aerial heat waves, w/ more stressful (S. California, Washington) regions matched w/ less stressful (Nor Cal, Alaska) ones. Alaska surveys are done - next stop, Nor Cal. 🦑🌊

A selfie of two happy PIs & three happy grad students after a successful day of fieldwork.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jul 3

Seaweed selfie! Collecting Alaskan *Alaria* for our global canopy-forming #seaweed traits network! @intertidaleco.bsky.social @jngriffy.bsky.social #PhycologyFriday #MarineLife🦑🌊

A selfie of me on a rocky shore, smiling and holding a kelp.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jul 3

Whelk convention at the lag screw that marks the corner of one of our #SwelterShelterNSF study plots. 🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌 #MarineLife 🦑🌊

~24 whelks - predatory snails - are gathered around a hex-head metal screw with a blue cable tie around it.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jul 1

I met a crabby new friend during today’s #SwelterShelterNSF fieldwork. #MarineLife 🦑🌊🦀

Photo of my hand, holding a shore crab (*Hemigrapsus nudus*) with a blurry transect tape, marker cone, clipboard, and intertidal rockweed bed in the background.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jun 29

Mountain wildflowers 🏔️🪻 #Bloomscrolling

Lupines and buttercups in an Alaskan alpine meadow

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jun 27

Amazing tiny floral bells. 🔔🌹 Rose twisted-stalk (*Streptopus lanceolatus*), Baranof Island, Alaska. #Bloomscrolling

Streptopus lanceolatus grows from a rhizome or seed, the stem having a zigzag shape, branched or sometimes unbranched. Up to 30 cm (12 in) tall with alternate wide lanced oval-shaped leaves with pointed tips and a rounded base, without leaf-stalks. The leaves are often finely toothed having fine hairs on the underside veins. Flowers appear as solitary individuals opposite each leaf in early summer (May to July) and are bell-shaped on 1–3 cm (0.4–1.2 in) long stalks bent midway, with 6 rose or white recurved petals with purple streaks.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jun 27

What’s this guy doing all the way up in the rockweed? 🌊⭐️🪨🌱🤔 #PhycologyFriday #MarineLife 🦑

An ochre star (*Pisaster ochraceus*) is surrounded by rockweed (*Fucus distichus*) on an Alaskan rocky shore.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jun 25

The calm before last night’s storm… ⛈️

Sunset reflections at ANB Harbor in Sitka, Alaska. Boats & their masts & stabie poles are silhouetted against the sky.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jun 25

It’s really impressive to see the shuttle in launch configuration! The last time I was at the California Science Center, I loved being able to walk around - & under (!) - the orbiter to get a sense for its size. 🚀

The space shuttle Endeavour on display at the California Science Center in 2022.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jun 23

Views from the Crescent Harbor breakwater, Sitka, Alaska.

Looking down the riprap breakwater toward Mt. Edgecumbe.

Looking down the boardwalk toward the Sitka Sound Science Center & fine arts camp campus.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jun 22

Science is for everyone 🌈🧪

Most of the 50-ml conical sample / centrifuge tubes I’ve used have blue caps, so I was happy to see these in an array of colors (red, orange, yellow, green, blue) sitting on a benchtop at the field station where I’m working right now. They are in a styrofoam rack in front of a window, with buildings, a tree-clad hill, and blue sky visible outside.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jun 21

Barnacles on barnacle! Baby barnacles often settle on or near adults of the same species. The big one & likely the little ones are the thatched barnacle *Semibalanus cariosus*. Because this species is a simultaneous hermaphrodite, this could be appropriate for either Father’s Day or Mother’s Day. 🦑

A huge thatched barnacle is surrounded by and festooned with very small barnacles.

Matt Bracken@brackenlab· Jun 21

We’re currently in Sitka, Alaska, setting up sites for our #SwelterShelterNSF study: measuring how intertidal foundation species - rockweeds & mussels - protect other species against aerial heat waves & determining whether loss of foundation species could lead to cascading biodiversity declines. 🦑🌊