Hello All Again! For those who don’t know me, my name is Amiyah Ogo and I attend Montezuma-Cortez High school! I am doing my internship at the REEF which part of the Marine Science Institute. This week was a lot of the same as my previous weeks, but i still learned a lot!
Sunday Me and my roommate and fellow intern, Taylor, went to downtown Santa Barbra to enjoy the day. We saw the new Minions Movie, Ate some good food, and we also went to the Art Museum.
Monday, due to the 4th of July, we had the day off. We mostly hung out for the day in the Isla Vista Area, but we attempted to go see fireworks. The Fireworks at the park ended up not happening without warning so we just went to Target to get some stuff and headed back and watched some random fireworks from our apartment.
Tuesday was when work started back up again! We did both food prep and feeding today so we could stay on schedule. We also had a UCSB class come into the REEF for a lab to explore some different organisms we have. the photo to the side is of a brittle star! which is actually not the same as a sea star. Brittle Stars are have much thinner arms, and they can grow them back a lot quicker than sea stars can
On Wednesday we started the day off with the Family Vacation Center Visiting the facility, as well as the Cliff Drive Care Center camp. Those were both really fun and we enjoyed sharing some cool facts about the organisms to the kids. We ended the day with siphoning, which is how we clean the tanks after feeding.
On Thursday we started the day with food prep, but since there were so many of us we also did some work around the REEF to clean it up a bit. I got rid of some spider webs outside, wiped down some counters, cleaned windows, and also carded some of the algae off the tanks. Carding is a way we clean off the acrylic tanks without scratching it. After our aquarist tasks we has the UCSB discovery program come in as well as UCSB orientation after that.
Friday we started the day off with the Extensive School Year program, which is a program for children with Autism. It was really fun and the
kids had a great time doing our beach activity and exploring the REEF. After that we did our aquarist tasks for the day, which was feeding. After feeding we did the weekly open door. Open door is the time we are open for the public! This is always fun and we had a great turnout. I also went to a concert with Taylor today as well and had a great time!
On Saturday we started the day off with siphoning and also doing a little bit of cleaning to get ready for the Open Door. After we were done with that we opened and then ended the day. On the way home I stopped at one of the restaurants to try some burgers everyone at the REEF had been talking about, and they were really good! During open door we also saw a small pod of dolphins feeding!
Today, Sunday, I volunteered with the REEF to get Tech Trek ready for the upcoming week! Tech Trek is a math and science camp for girls, and I’m excited to spend my last week here at the REEF working with the campers.
One cool thing I have learned and whiteness has been that Chestnut 
Cowries can actually polish their own shell. They polish them with their mantle, this flap of skin can actually wrap around their entire shell. This not only helps them as a defense mechanism, but also as a way to heal cracks in their shell, as well as get rid of any parasites. The picture on the right demonstrates this.we got some 
Orange Peel Dorids this week as well, which are a type of sea slug! The picture on the left is an Orange Peel Dorid.
In my free time, as mentioned I’ve been enjoying what Santa Barbra and Isla Vista has to offer. Exploring downtown SB, Seeing a concert in the SB Bowl, and trying local restaurants, as well as enjoying the ocean
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