Research associate Troy Alphin, left, and Martin Posey, a biology professor at the 

 University of North Carolina at Wilmington, examine their finds after they sweep for crabs. 



Although tiny, juvenile blue crabs grow into the most important 

 commercial fishery species in the Southeast. 



being examined head to toe every week." 



But Paerl says it's important to 

 always look ahead in research. He and 

 Joseph S. Ramus, professor of marine 

 biology with Duke's Marine Laboratory 

 in Beaufort, have set their sights on 

 Pamlico Sound at the mouth of the 

 Neuse River as the next logical step for 

 study. They say Pamlico Sound is the 

 largest estuary in the United States 

 about which the least is known. It 

 processes almost half of the state's 

 freshwater runoff and receives water 

 from five large watersheds. It is also a 

 critically important fisheries nursery and 

 recruitment habitat for North Carolina 

 and the southeastern Atlantic coast. 



"The blooms seem to be moving 

 farther down the system," Paerl says 

 about the need to monitor and evaluate 

 water quality in the sound. "I think it's 

 inevitable." 



Getting 

 total 

 Blue Crabs ... 

 Flexibility 

 Required 



D 



I load maps have a way of getting 

 revised, reworked and just plain 

 scrapped in research. 



Ten years ago, when biology 

 professor Martin Posey received his first 

 funding from North Carolina Sea Grant, 

 he started out studying how marine life 

 in general uses offshore reefs and sand 

 flats as habitats. 



Now the University of North 

 Carolina at Wilmington researcher 



focuses on the habitats of blue crabs in 

 particular — juvenile blue crabs to be 

 exact. Five months into that two-year 

 study, he was already discovering surprises 

 about the kinds of places the thumbnail- 

 sized young crabs may find refuge. 



In a new twist, the scientists are 

 looking into whether the tiny crusta- 

 ceans turn to low-salinity waters as 

 places to grow and avoid predators 

 rather than only hide out in saltwater 

 structures like sea grass or oyster shells. 



"That's something we didn't even 

 know about when we wrote this 

 proposal," Posey says. 



But research can take scientists 

 through twists and turns they never 

 imagined and challenge their original 

 expectations. It takes flexibility and time 

 to find answers to questions that keep 

 changing. 



Posey decided to focus on blue 

 crabs because of their economic 

 importance, and his research is all the 



22 AUTUMN 1998 



