The Cooperative Institute for Climate, Ocean, and Ecosystem Studies

My name is Lydell Mitchell, and I am an upcoming senior at Montana State University, where I am majoring in Fish & Wildlife Management. This past Summer, as a CICOES Intern, I worked with Lisa Wetzel, Shelley Johnson, Tessa Code, and Arielle Tonus Ellis to assess the vertical distribution of Daphnia between day and night at differing levels of light pollution in Lake Washington, Washington. I worked at the USGS Fisheries Research Center, as well as making occasional visits to the UW Fisheries Science Building.

The beginning of my Summer started with side projects, such as dissecting American Shad with my mentor, Lisa Wetzel, or helping with the Shasta Lake zooplankton project by conducting counts and identification. I also assisted with zooplankton collection in June for the UW Schindler Limnology Lab Lake Washington data. All of these side projects thoroughly prepared me to undertake my own research project. A date was finally set to collect my own zooplankton samples on Lake Washington, taking into account the moonlight for nighttime sampling. We sampled day and night at two different sites with differing levels of light pollution. After collecting the zooplankton samples, they were then analyzed in the lab. This was very interesting and exciting as it was my first time analyzing samples for my own research. Lab work involved taking counts and identifying different zooplankton species under a dissection microscope. After all samples were analyzed and documented on data sheets, I entered the data into an Excel spreadsheet. With the help of my mentors, I created various graphs to show the vertical distribution of Daphnia at different depth ranges with a 95% CI. I was also able to compare my data to 1987 data at one of our chosen sampling sites. This entire process of conducting and analyzing research helped me tremendously. It allowed me to develop skills in fieldwork, laboratory work, and data analysis to answer a question.

The CICOES Internship program enabled me to gain valuable experience in my field and develop practical networking skills. It also gave me the confidence I lacked at the beginning to envision myself as a future research scientist. The weekly seminars opened my eyes to the variety of topics that research scientists study and how they are all connected in a way. My favorite part of this internship was the versatility of the work I did, which included fieldwork, laboratory work, and office tasks. This is something I will carry into my future career. I was very grateful to have met such amazing people, including the other interns and CICOES staff, as well as all the extraordinary individuals I worked with at USGS. I want to thank the CICOES program and my mentors for an exceptional experience!

Project Introduction

Research Poster