Wall-E's brother: Hector the Collecter!

Hector the Collector!

I woke up this morning excited to get the day started as I put on my baby blue polo with that spectacular badge stitched over my heart that reads "Save the Harbor, Save the Bay." As usual on a Wednesday morning, I made my way to Community Boating eager to commence our activities. That was when I was informed that the Rozalia project had set up shop on the maintenance deck. To be honest, I did not know what the Rozalia project was, in full detail, until today! When Sarah Bailey, my senior marine educator, asked who wanted to take the kids to maintenance deck, my curiosity exceeded me. I wanted to learn more about this project and what its mission was. I found out that the Rozalia Project is an organization that cleans up the trash in our waters using various methods. As a future engineer, I was excited to find out that the method they chose to present on this beautiful hot summer day was an ROV named Hector the Collector!

The Controls

Hector the Collector is controlled by a computer with a monitoring screen. Connected to this computer is a controller but not like the one you might use for your Xbox or Playstation. They even had a computer that monitored the sonar placed right under the camera on Hector! It was really cool seeing all this technology! It is great exposing the kids to these such things because technology is a growing market in our society.

The net support for Hector the Collector

It was a great presentation and the kids loved it! They got to see what was under water and at bottom of the river through the camera located on the front of Hector. Some of the kids even helped pull the trash out of the water by placing a net under Hector when he grabbed a plastic cup or a corroded can and catching it when the claw released. I was so fascinated by the technology and wanted to learn everything I could about this robot. I love my job now more than ever for exposing me to this because I would not have experienced such a wonderful activity had I not joined the Save the Harbor team!

Engaged in our learning!

The best part of this one hour lesson with the Rozalia Project was finding a not so common piece of trash at the bottom of the Charles River. As we watched Hector the Collector prowl the river floor on the monitor we noticed something sticking out of the muddy sand. It was dark colored and coiled which at first we thought was a spring of some sort. Then as I looked at it closer, I thought it looked more like a key chain. When we finally got it hooked and brought it up to the surface, it did in fact turn out to be a key chain with one key attached! It was the first key found by the Rozalia Project and Save the Harbor and Community boating were the first to experience it with them as well!

Collin reunited with his key!

To make it even better, as we were valiantly showing off the key we had found, a community boating staff realized that it was their key that we had found. His name was Collin and he identified his key that he had last three weeks prior to the Rozalia project visit. The key opened up the fitting rooms in a Banana Republic he worked in as a second job. Not only were we the first group to find a key with the Rozalia project, we were also the first group to reunite a lost key found in the waters to its rightful owner. What a morning that was! This has to be the best day of my summer so far!

Surviving a Heat Wave!

Whoa was it hot today! With temperatures reaching a staggering 91 degrees today the STH/STB had to get creative with our activities to try to minimize our exposure to the intense heat! At Community Boating this morning we were greeted with a surprise when we discovered that the Rozalia Project had set up and brought their Remotely Operated Underwater Vehicle, or ROV, to teach kids the importance of cleaning up marine trash.

Top Ten Pieces of Marine Trash

 Rachel, the director at Rozalia, had the kids guess what the top ten most abundant types of marine trash were. The kids were surprised to realize that the majority of trash are items that would come from a picnic, things like wrappers, plates, and utensils. The kids all enjoyed taking turns helping the ROV remove trash from the bottom of the Charles River and taking those pesky pieces of plastic that when left in the ocean/river take up to 450 years before they degrade!

Chalk animals!

We spent our afternoon at Courageous in Charlestown and we all learned about invertebrates! All week we have been pulling up our lobster pots that are full of sea stars, crabs, lobsters, and mussels without knowing much about these incredible organisms. We sat as a group and named all the invertebrates we could think of and then placed them into categories based on defining characteristics. Then we broke into groups and drew our very own invertebrates with chalk and had to categorize our invertebrate into echinoderm (spiny skin), mollusc (soft body), arthropod (jointed limbs), cnidarian (stinging cells), porifera (sponges), or annalid (segmented body).

Of course with all this learning we had to take a break- so when a game of jump rope was started, we had to join.

Stellar Jump-Roping Skills

What a full day it was out on the river and harbor, and we look forward to tomorrow to continue to have fun, learn and play in the middle of the heat wave.

And as always- take chances, ask questions, get messy!- Sarah B

WHAT AN EXCITING WEEK

On Monday we had a new group of kids. 
There was one kid who felt lonely because he the was the only one from the old group and didn’t wanted to talk to the new kids, so I came up with a game so everyone could meet him. The game is called HELLO SHANE  - the last person to say hello to Shane loses. It was a quick way for him to meet the new kids. Therefore, Shane felt happy and the day went great for the kids and myself.     

We spent time with the Rozalia Project, picking trash up off the bottom of the Harbor so that the ocean can be clean. They also explained how long it takes for bottles to disintegrate into pieces in the ocean and how some fish might eat them. Someone from our staff drove an under water robot and there was so much trash that the robot’s claws broke.

Later in the day, we took a group of kids fishing and they were all exhausted except for this kid named Tim who caught a sunfish. As I was trying to un-hook it, it pooped on my fingers. The next day, Tim caught another sunfish and the fish laid eggs on my hand. What a weird weekend. Anne and I witnessed the birth of some sunfish, it was a very exciting moment and it made my day.
 ON Friday afternoon, Thanks to Ali, the YMCA kids were organized to each activity we planned. My group caught a small lobster and we named it flapee, because it wouldn’t stop flapping. 

At the Courageous Sailing Center, we caught another lobster but this one was about 10 pounds and it had huge claws that I’ve never seen before. This was the most exciting day of my week because I took the big lobster home and my mom made a lobster salad. It was good. A lot of meat out of it for a 10 pound lobster!

 I had a great weekend and hope to have the same week for the rest of the summer.

A Robot That Picks Up Trash? You Bet!

Yesterday on the Charles River, we had yet another iffy-weather day, but that did not stop the kids from learning something new and very exciting! Community Boating had a special guest yesterday -- the crew from the Rozalia Project was in town to show off their amazing "robot" that swims underwater to pick up trash! Straight from their website, "Rozalia Project is unique and action based taking trash out of the water, rather than just pointing at it, and operating nationwide from docks and shorelines and throughout New England from the record-breaking circumnavigator and Ted Hood 60’, American Promise. We connect people of all ages to their underwater world and inspire them to be part of the solution by using underwater robots (ROVs) and sonar as well as nets to locate and remove marine debris. We are committed to accurate data collection and working with stakeholders (sailors, fishermen, boaters, citizens, schools, town leadership and more) to clean up and forward solutions to the problem of marine debris..."

The amazing underwater robot

Hillel and Tommy admiring the collected debris from the river

Recording the mysterious findings!

A sample of the debris

Watching the robot on the computer screen "swim" underwater was fascinating, and the kids loved watching the crew try to navigate the robot's claws to pick up the pieces of trash/marine debris.  The crew even allowed the boys to help them record the findings, along with using the net to capture the debris from the robot's claws!

Along with the excitement over the Rozalia Project, we ended this week at the river on a high note, by catching lots and lots of sunfish! One of the girls decided to try something new for bait -- sliced ham, that she brought from home. Fortunately, the fish bought in, which was good news for the kids. Next week promises to bring even more exciting adventures full of eels, sunfish, crabs ... and perhaps even more ham bait?!

-Ashley Wakefield, Senior Harbor Educator at Boston Children's Museum and Community Boating

Lots of Lobster with Rozalia!

Today at Courageous Sailing Center, the campers pulled up lobster traps that not only had lobsters in them, but one was absolutely humongous! The lobster was male and estimated to be about 8-10 pounds. The other two lobsters caught were about 1-2 pounds.

Also today at CSC, all the Harbor Explorers enjoyed meeting all the members of the Rozalia project and learned about marine debris. To my surprise, many items that wind up in the ocean take a very long time to degrade in the ocean, and even though it looks like they are gone, they still exist in the water. For example, plastic breaks up into little tiny pieces called micro plastics, which take upwards of 20 years to eventually be completely gone. So anything that was thrown into the ocean that was plastic when I was only two years old, has finally been completely corroded away.

The Rozalia project helps clean out many of these horrible things in our harbor and disposes of the waste properly. They do lots of beach clean ups and also use their boat, The American Promise, to collect the trash. What the Harbor Explorers enjoyed seeing put to use was the Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV), which dives down to the bottom of the bay and picks up pieces of trash from the bottom. This is particularly useful in areas where the sediments might be too toxic to dredge.

It was an exciting day for the Harbor Explorers and I am happy to be with them at Piers Park and Courageous this week. See you all soon!

Annie

Au revoir!

Is it already time to say goodbye?

At Save the Harbor/Save the Bay, 'tis the season where we say goodbye to the staff, kids, parents, and excitement of the summer youth programs. :( And what an exciting summer we had!

Some of my fondest memories of Boston came from the kids at all of our program sites around the city. At Community Boating, I will remember the wind on the Charles river whipping through the sails of boats, the smiles produced from first-caught fish, and the clumpy cumulus clouds. At Boston Children's museum, I will remember the expression created on a child's face after beholding a lobster for the first time. At Courageous Sailing Center, I will remember teaching kids about marine debris, and recovering it using a Remote Operated Vehicle with the Rozalia Project.

Other Save the Harbor highlights come from the work I did as part of a team of AMAZING staffers. I enjoyed being able to mentor my coworkers and learn from them simultaneously. Special thanks to Michelle Palermino and Brianne Studer for keeping the team running like a well-oiled machine.

Most of all, I will remember the impact I was able to make on Boston's youth. Hopefully, all of the children we worked this this summer have learned to love and respect their local marine environment, Boston Harbor. It was more than rewarding to be able to share my love of the sea, and teach about its creatures and systems.

This summer, I educated and was educated in return. I trust that the things I learned about Boston, working with kids, being part of a team, and even about myself, will serve me well in my future endeavors. I am excited to apply my new found knowledge!

Thanks to Save the Harbor/ Save the bay for an amazing summer!

Cheers,

Sheuli

Mystery Bottle

At Communnity Boating there was this program call Rozalia Projects Rov, found an old milk bottle that was stamped 1938 on the bottom Hood milk company . They alson found a hat,nike sneaker,3 pairs of sunclasses, red sox pants and an old chair so the kids built a men with all the trash they found.

Candido

Nothing Beats a Cool Gadget!

One thing that will get me as excited as the kids I’m working with this summer is a cool toy. This isn’t any ordinary toy. It’s a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) equipped with a camera and grabbers. Like the kids at Courageous Sailing, I was trilled to see Rachel, the founder of the Rozalia Project, drive this little submarine with ease. I watched the ROV go up and down from the surface to the harbor’s floor to pick up and collect several pieces of trash. The trash included many aluminum cans and plastic bottles with the occasional object that we couldn’t tell what it was. We even came across a chair, though we weren’t able to retrieve it because the ROV wasn’t strong enough to bring it up.

While the Courageous sailors were out doing other things, I spent time getting to know Rachel and the program she had founded. The Rozalia Project, named in honor of Rachel’s grandmother, is based on a beautiful sailboat that is equipped with this ROV to pick up trash out of the harbor and along the east coast of the United States. The sailboat they use is called, American Promise, and was once used to set a world record. A young man sailed it around the world in the 80’s alone in about 150 days and beat the world record at the time by about 60 days. I’d say that’s pretty darn cool if you ask me! Now it’s used for something equally awesome and I hope to keep in touch with the project to see how they are doing.

-Annie Adams

Trashlisting @ Community Boating

Friday, we were delighted to see the Rozalia Project yet again at Community Boating! Using their fancy ROV (remote operated vehicle) Rachel @ Rozalia Project and a plethora of copilots from CBI's environmental group roved the seafloor looking for marine debris.

Among the fabulous trash finds were the following not-so-small objects:

1 Main Sail lost last year

1 glass HOOD milk bottle from the 1930s

1 aluminum foldable chair

In fact, Save the Harbor and CBI staff and sailors helped the Rozalia Project catalog their findings in this same fashion! We found plastic bags, bottles, cans, clothes and even shoes! Who would have thought such a mess existed just a few meters below the surface?

At the end of the day, the logged trash was used for Rozalia Project's Trash Bash, and everyonewas happy to wash their hands!

The Rozalia Project Visits Charlestown

It was a fascinating week for the sailors, instructors, and Save the Harbor staffers at Courageous Sailing Center in Charlestown this week. The Rozalia Project, a initiative to rid our harbors of waste-- one piece of submerged trash at a time-- has been docked at Courageous all week. And with an underwater robot, sonar equipment, and underwater cameras on board, there's a definite buzz of excitement around the historic sailboat and the work that it's been doing all over the East Coast!


Rachael Miller and James Lyne, founders of the project, and their summer intern Sloan have been showing Charlestown's sailors around their "mothership" and searching the harbor floor around Pier 4 for trash to pull up to the surface and dispose of properly. Maneuvering a robotic ROV (Remotely Operated Vehicle) with a camera through the water and along the ocean floor, Rachael and James have pull up hundreds of pieces of trash along the East Coast. The Courageous sailors have helped search for "dark spots" on the sonar, keeping their eyes peeled on the underwater camera equipment for the masses ahead to materialize into bottles, cans, and pipes through the water and sediment. Then, Rachael or James controls the ROV to grab the piece of trash with its claw and come up to the surface, where the other is waiting with a net to rid the waters of that piece of waste!

We don't often think about how long our trash sticks around after we are done using it. We put it out on a curb, or throw it in a bin, and then it's off to a landfill, out of sight and out of mind. But if we throw it into the Harbor, Courageous's sailors (thanks to Rachael, James, and Sloan!) now know exactly how long it will stick around and be a hazard for our region's marine life:

- An apple core: 2 months.
- A cigarette: 5 - 15 years.
- Plastic water bottle: 80 - 200 years.
- Beverage can: 300 - 500 years.
- Fishing line: 600 years.
- Glass bottles: 1,000,000 years.

And those are simply the timelines for materials to get broken down enough to not be choking hazards-- but the materials themselves never actually disappear. So there are tiny plastics and wastes being eaten by marine creatures, many of which are eaten by humans. So, yes, the plastic water bottles and metal soda cans we dispose of are even making their way into the human diet over time. Gross!

The Rozalia Project is doing great things not only to physically clean up harbors around the region, but to shift mindsets and educate young people about proper disposal of wastes around our world's water systems. I know, because of Rachael, James, and Sloan, there are dozens of sailors and Save the Harbor staffers who are now even more conscious of their interactions with the marine environment in Boston-- and I wish the Rozalia crew the best of luck as they move on to other ports and affect even greater change! Thank you!

To find out even more about the Rozalia Project, visit www.rozaliaproject.org!

Michelle