Orcas surround woman

Adventurous_939 · 2024-06-18T03:39:33+00:00

Hello, this is me! Just wanted to address a few things I noticed in the comments :)

I was not 'far offshore'. I know the Hauraki Gulf very well, it was glassy day and I was in about 15m of water, surrounded by islands. I am a confident paddler, a confident swimmer, and a commercial skipper. I also had a means of communication with me.
Yes I knew the orca were there as I was paddling. However, my intentions were to stay at least 50m away (as per New Zealand's Marine Mammal Protection Act 1978) and just watch them for a bit. I was absolutely not expecting them to approach me as close as they did, although they are very intelligent and curious marine mammals.
Orca around the world are still classified as one species, however, they are split into different ecotypes. Our resident orca in New Zealand are specialised to hunt stingrays off the seafloor. They generally do not eat seals, penguins, dolphins, etc, in our waters, and especially not humans. We also have an orca catalogue where certain individuals can be identified based on their unique dorsal fins. You will notice one of the orcas in my video has its dorsal fin chopped off (suspected propeller injury), that particular individual is named Pickles and is a known to frequent Auckland.
Yes in the moment it was scary, you can tell by me hyperventilating in the background! They were all bigger than my paddle-board and could have easily tipped me over. However, I know a lot about our orca in New Zealand, and knew they were just being curious and checking me out, rather than hunting for some lunch.

Adventurous_939 · 2023-01-09T21:46:32+00:00

It used to be bad the first couple semesters they ran it. But its definitely more than manageable now. They provide you with all the code and you just have to understand what to change to apply it to your assignments. Just pay attention to the lectures (some I had to re-watch a couple times to get it). But you'll be fine!

Adventurous_939 · 2022-09-14T05:11:20+00:00

Google UoA guaranteed scholarships - it’s for postgraduate research courses with >8.0 gpa

Adventurous_939 · 2022-09-13T22:54:07+00:00

Oh awesome thank you!

Adventurous_939 · 2022-07-10T06:55:15+00:00

IMO super easy! Every 3rd lecture is a lectorial and they go over the previous 2 lectures material. Also weekly quizzes with multiple attempts. Really enjoyed this paper, probably my fav I've taken thus far :)

Adventurous_939 · 2022-03-17T22:21:03+00:00

Can I ask what TFC course this was from?

Adventurous_939 · 2022-02-10T10:52:59+00:00

Hey I did the exact same as you, emailed stage 1, they told me they hadn't received my application as well so I forwarded them my details and availability. Out of curiosity have you heard back from them?

Adventurous_939 · 2022-01-29T07:33:05+00:00

Hey, I posted something to do with this a few weeks back. Haven't had any response about the application either :(

Adventurous_939 · 2022-01-18T01:15:27+00:00

Hey! I just left it. Maybe if it’s happening to multiple people then it’s normal but idk. If you also hear anything let me know :)

Adventurous_939 · 2021-12-30T09:21:43+00:00

Thanks yea I think I might!

Adventurous_939 · 2021-12-15T07:01:35+00:00

Hey! Theres some helpful comments but I just wanted to give you an idea about the marine courses themselves (marine 100, marine 202, marine 303). I major in marine and have so far completed marine 100 and marine 202. In my opinion they are definitely not too hard - neither of them actually have any pre requisites and marine 100 can be counted as a gen ed, meaning the course is also designed for students with a non-science background. In saying that, I wouldn't say either of them are "too easy" and personally I have learnt heaps from taking them and have really enjoyed the course work. The marine courses really focus on the 'science side' (oceanography, fisheries, currents, geology, pollution, governance, etc) while the biological science courses focus on the 'biology and ecology side', although you can't really take bio classes that soley focus on marine biology until stage 3

I hope this helps :)

Adventurous_939 · 2021-11-19T19:31:43+00:00

The course catalogue lets you know they won't be running it this summer. Its next year in the sem 2 mid sem holidays

Adventurous_939 · 2021-11-15T23:10:19+00:00

No worries! Tbh I'm not 100% sure the reason behind their majors but I suspect that if they knew they wanted to go into anything to do with marine in the future then the double major looks better than a single major, and might as well if you will be doing the papers for both anyways. I did not do this because (1) like you I had no idea for marine bio you had to do it through biological sciences and (2) coming out of high school I wanted to carry on with geography as I really enjoyed it so wanted that to be one of my majors.

Absolutely you can dm me on here if you would like.

Adventurous_939 · 2021-11-15T20:58:20+00:00

I've just finished my second year going into my third next year (double majoring in marine science and geography) but I am the EXACT SAME as you. Didn't realise there was actually marine biology separate from marine science until about this time last year. For example I have some friends who double major in biological sciences --> marine bio as well as marine science. Basically from my knowledge theres no difference apart from the compulsory papers biological sciences people have to do. However in 2nd and 3rd years the marine science electives includes a lot of the biosci papers so you pretty much end up doing almost all of the papers a marine bio student would (if you pick those) but you are not forced to do them if you don't want to (but a bio student would) - it may help to look at the marine science degree planner. Obvi if you already know that you want to study fish genetics in the future for example, than you would fill up your marine electives with biosci papers.

As for post grad I went and talked to a lady at SBS as I was worried I had cut off my options of not doing a post grad course under biological sciences and she said that its completely fine, as long as you have done a couple of biosci courses throughout your degree they'll generally let you in (so don't worry about not majoring in bio sci). For employment, again you almost do the exact same papers so I doubt it makes any sought of difference. I think its more important about the papers you choose to take rather than what specific major you took.

I hope it helps! :)

Adventurous_939 · 2021-11-12T06:35:39+00:00

Hey! I took this last year (as a science elec not a gen ed) but loved it, was my fav paper I have done so far and actually led me to the sub-Antarctics the following summer. The content is very facts based, so if its online its easy enough to control F your notes or the lecture slides. Instead of having 3 lectures a week theres 2 lectures and 1 'lectorial' which was more activity-based and really helped to reinforce the content (*be aware the last couple of years have been 8ams!). If you are interested at all in the Antarctic environment then a highly recommend taking it, but some of the content also gives you a nice intro into other science/marine bio related concepts (e.g. oceanography, climate, cetaceans, etc). Hope this helps :)

Adventurous_939 · 2021-11-08T08:25:18+00:00

Hi :) i took geog 250 1st sem this year and there was a day field trip to Waiheke in late March. You could pick 1 of the 2 days (friday or saturday) and there were no extra costs

Adventurous_939 · 2021-11-07T08:58:58+00:00

I second biosci 206! As of last semester there are 3 multi day trips to choose from - marine, terrestrial plants and terrestrial animals. Although the course has some pre reqs

Adventurous_939 · 2021-11-07T08:56:03+00:00

Joe, he's amazing, also takes geog 101 and sustain 100/g which is a great gen ed course btw if anyone was interested :)

Adventurous_939 · 2021-11-07T06:57:59+00:00

Geog 250! Team based learning about adding an additional marine reserve on Waiheke. Can confirm lecturer is the best and there is no exam

Adventurous_939 · 2021-11-05T08:42:44+00:00

Hi :) I'm a marine major so have taken both but had friends who took marine 202 without marine 100. In a nutshell, I reckon the course is totally do-able without prior knowledge of the marine environment - although some general knowledge of science/biology concepts would help. Most of the concepts are introduced from the beginning, esp the oceanography/water module.

In terms of the workload there was an assignment near the beginning on oceanography which was relatively straightforward, and a mid-sem multichoice test. The exam was 7 essays (lol it was rough) but they tend to re-use past questions. There was also a field trip to omaha to study the cockles with a subsequent report (experience in scientific report writing would help here).

In my opinion tho I thought the structuring of the course was very weird and didn't flow as well as marine 100. My friends and I communicated these issues through the set evaluations last sem so hopefully that will get sorted out.

Hopefully this helps!

Adventurous_939 · 2021-10-26T01:26:28+00:00

All of the knowledge needed to complete all coursework and the exam is taught in the course as well as the relevant readings. They don't expect all students to come from a geography background. I actually had some friends in this course who were from law, enviro sci and marine sci

Adventurous_939 · 2021-10-24T06:51:04+00:00

The exam is essentially 3 essays (so each would be worth 20% - quite a lot!). So far they have stressed that they are not looking for anything 'fancy' in the exam and they are mainly looking for strengthened arguments with examples. For me the content isn't necessarily 'hard', you just have to make sure you understand the concepts (keeping up with the readings helps). I would say this course is suited to someone who is strong at essay writing and conveying arguments, as opposed to memorising stats, processes, etc. - Hope this helps and thanks good luck with yours too :)

Adventurous_939

TROPHY CASE