What Can You Do?

Marine Biology all isn’t about being in a laboratory all day studying fish. There is many different fields that you can work at with a Marine Biology Degree. Since there is so many things you can do with Marine Biology I’m only going to list a few or else I would go on all night.

Aquarist:

An Aquarist is someone who works with marine species in an aquarium. They make sure the water and tanks are clean, keep track of the animal’s health and wellbeing and they would feed them. They are also in charge of some training responsibilities. You can acquire this job by having your bachelor degree and being a certified diver because you would be doing a lot of swimming.

Oceanography:

Oceanography is not what it sounds like. You don’t just go out and take pictures of the ocean and the species inside of them even though that’s what it sounds like you would be doing. You would be studying the ocean as a whole instead of the organisms that live there. Oceanographers keep track of the chemical balances in the ocean and also the physical components of the ocean.

Fishery Manager:

This is the part of Marine Biology that tries to protect fish and seek new ways to keep fish from going extinct. They also protect them from poachers and anybody else trying to hunt them. They tell you when, where and how you can catch the fish by making rules and regulations. They make it so you’ll have to have a permit before you can go fishing.

Marine Biochemist:

                Marine Biochemistry is basically the modeling of carbon and nutrient cycling in ocean systems.

As you can see there are many different varieties of jobs that go along with Marine Biology if you’re not the kind of person who wants to sit in a lab all day and look at different organisms. There are other job opportunities out there that let you go and explore the world. You can look up more ocean jobs here: http://www.marineinsight.com/careers-2/a-list-of-unique-and-interesting-marine-careers/ 

 

 

 

 

The Best Marine Animals to Train

Training marine animals always seemed of interest to a lot of people. I mean who wouldn’t want to swim with dolphins or sea lions on a daily basis? It’s not just all fun and play though. You have to care for the animal on ALL levels. You have to gain the animals trust to allow you to take care of them properly because if they do not trust, you cannot train them or care for them.  I’m not here to talk about all the nasty parts of training animals, but what I am going to talk about is the best animals to train ( in my opinion).

1. Taking the number one spot of the top 3 marine mammals to train would be Dolphins! Dolphins are really smart and energetic animals that really like to put on a show. Like I said before you can’t train them unless they trust you, you can get them to trust you by working with them every day and playing with them so they know you’re say and you won’t harm them. Watch here for a video on dolphin training:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdNWJ54bQX8  Dolphins learn their moves by hand motions, high whistles and positive reinforcement like fish, toys and play time with the trainers. For me, I love to swim so this would be perfect way to spend my day every day.

2.  Killer Whales

First off killer whales are not actually whales, they belong to the dolphin family. Training the whales would be a lot like training the dolphins except your would need a lot more fish and bigger toys for the positive reinforcement. People don’t usually don’t have a desire to train killer whales (Orcas) because one of their name killer whale and two because they have heard of a few incidences where the whale has killed their trainer. The truth is every wild animal in captivity has a chance to be aggressive and you never really know when that aggression will come out, that’s just the risk a lot of trainers are willing to take.  But enough with the bad stuff onto the fun stuff. Even though whales are huge animals they can do amazing stunts. You mostly won’t see killer whales anywhere in captivity except for sea world and a few other places, so that is where you would have to go to train them.

3. My last and final animal that I would want to train is a tie between sea lions and penguins.

The dilemma with this one is penguins aren’t really trained in an aquarium, they just do their own thing unless it’s feeding time then that is when they are under the trainer’s control. Even though they technically don’t get trained it would still be interesting to work with the penguins even though they stink. Sea lions would be another fun animal to work with because they are the most energetic out of all the animals I have listed already. They don’t do as high of jump as dolphins or whales, but they can do a lot more interesting tricks that just that. When you go to a zoo and see a little sea lion “feeding”, well that is a show to put on for people and it is also a practice session for the sea lions to keep the tricks in their head.

All these animals would be an amazing experience to train, but the bad thing about it all is it takes A LOT of work to even become a trainer. People think you don’t need a four year degree to become a trainer, but you do. You need to learn the anatomy of the animal and as a trainer you are supposed to tell if there is something wrong with your animal and to know that you have to know what all is inside its body. You can learn more about how to become a trainer and what it takes to train an animal here:  http://www.dolphinencounters.com/education-how.php

Reasons to Become a Marine Biologist

            For the vast majority of my life I have wanted to be a marine biologist. There are so many careers you can get into when doing marine biology, all of which tantalize me.  The ocean is strange and mysterious, yet mesmerizing place. Some may think that the ocean is a scary place, which can be very true. The ocean makes up more than half of the Earth, most of which has not been discovered yet, so the idea of not knowing what is out there can be very scary and overwhelming. Below I’m going to list just a few of the reason I want to become a marine biologist and how this career would be life-changing for me as well as others interested in this field.

1.      You can travel the world while exploring marine biology.

Marine biology can be studied literally anywhere that there is a body of water, mainly near the ocean. With this being said there is a huge need for marine biologist around the world. This being said means that you have the chance of traveling the world and doing marine biology literally anywhere imaginable. This allows you to experience so much more than you could if you were stuck being a teacher at some small town in let’s just say Oklahoma where there aren’t many opportunities for a marine biologist job.

2.      You get to experience beautiful scenes and creatures no one else gets to.

When you think of marine biology you think of people training dolphins and Sea World, which is completely right. I think of the chance of being able to scuba dive and see first-hand the beautiful creatures that this world has to offer. This being said, once again, majority of the ocean life has yet to be discovered yet, this exhilarates me and makes me want to go out and explore this world myself. There are so many places you see in pictures that are just amazingly beautiful. Well, you know the expression “pictures don’t do the real scene justice?” That is exactly what I am talking about. If we see pictures of the ocean that are completely breath taking but yet the real scene is even more beautiful than imaginable then why wouldn’t someone want to experience that first-hand? I know I do and marine biology is the perfect way to do so.
Here you can see just a glimpse of how beautiful the ocean is: Scuba Diving Footage  

3.      People are always discovering new beings and places under the surface of the sea.

72% of the Earth is water and majority of the Earth’s population don’t know what is in our seas and oceans. Almost every day there is something new being discovered, whether it is a new species, coral or place, it’s still new and exciting. I can’t think of once single case where you would have a boring day if you were a marine biologist. I want to be one of those people who go out and discover something new, first hand. This world is beautiful and tantalizing and I want to be apart of that.

4.      You get to work with dolphins.

Dolphins are said to be one of the smartest creatures known to existence. With that being said, we have only begun to tap into what they are capable of and how smart they really are. If we don’t have that much knowledge of what they can do or how smart they are, then imagine what we actually don’t know about dolphins. There’s so much to learn about dolphins and from dolphins. Who wouldn’t want to experience that? The fact that we can actually help train then when there’s a possibility of them being just as equally smart as us is mind blowing.