Tyler Black (00:04):
Basically, I'm looking to understand how oil spills impact marine organisms using a toxicology lens, and particularly what happens to bivalves and more specifically clams that hold ecological, economic and cultural value after they're impacted by an oil spill. So by understanding what happens to clam populations, the hope is that this will help focus restoration efforts down the road.

Alina Baker (00:28):
You're listening to The Why & How Podcast produced by the Ontario Agricultural College of the University of Guelph, where we look to answer big questions in Agriculture, Food and the environment through casual conversations rooted in research.
Hello, everyone, I hope you all are doing well. It is a real pleasure to be here. I know it's been a while and you're probably dying to hear more about the awesome research going on in the OAC. But first things first. Obviously, you're listening to a new voice this episode. So let's take a moment to address that. My name is Alina Baker, and I've had the pleasure of hosting a few episodes over the summer. Graeme, your previous host, did an awesome job of hosting the last batch of episodes. So a big huge kudos to Graeme. 
When I was invited to do this I was honestly a bit nervous because this is something completely new for me. But I can honestly say it's been an amazing experience speaking one on one with researchers, getting to ask questions, and now being able to share that with you, the audience. But enough about me. I also have some more news for you before we dive into today's episode. We're also being joined by a new friend of the show, who we'll hear from in just a bit. Her name is Talia Dyer. Honestly shout out to her because she's done an awesome job of supporting me and pushing the conversation along with our amazing guests. So Talia, how are you feeling now that we've kicked Jordan and Graeme off the show?

Talia Dyer (01:56):
Well, Alina I wouldn't quite say we've kicked them off the show, but we are definitely eager to get the podcast rolling again. Jordan, the previous friend of the show, will still be here behind the scenes in his new role as producer. So thanks so much for the introduction. I'm excited to be here and fully embrace our new roles on The Why and How podcast.

Alina Baker (02:21):
Sounds good. I guess it's finally time to let the audience in on what we discussed with today's guest. Tyler Black is in the beginning stages of his PhD in environmental sciences. He's looking into assessing the impacts of marine oil spills to bivalves, and from our conversation I've gathered that bivalves are aquatic animals inclusive of the many species of clams, oysters, mussels and scallops. 
So a lot of Tyler's work is really to assess the true impact of marine oil spills to these creatures as well as understand what inhibits restoration of their populations. So Talia, what has been the most fascinating part of this conversation for you?

Talia Dyer (03:01):
It's really interesting, because we often hear about oil spills, but not necessarily the long term effects on the environment. In this case, the impacts on the Heiltsuk First Nation. So it was just, generally a great episode and good to learn about this research. Did you have a highlight from the conversation?

Alina Baker (03:23):
Yes, actually, the entire conversation was very insightful for me. So a bit of background about myself. I actually grew up on one of the islands of the Bahamas. So anything that has to do with coastal environments, or marine life and the factors that affect these ecosystems, that really interests me, and it's very important to me. 
So just hearing that he is so passionate about this work, and it just everything that he's doing was really amazing for me, and we're excited for you all to hear. So without further ado, let's dive right in. So Tyler, it's great to have you here today. How are you?

Tyler Black (03:59):
I'm doing super well. Excited to be here to talk to you a bit about the research I'm doing. Yeah, thanks so much for having me.

Alina Baker (04:07):
Perfect. So I understand your current research is about assessing the impact of marine oil spills to bivalves and just other areas of like coastal environments. I just wanted to start off by saying that just a bit about me. My background, I'm actually from the Bahamas. So any research into marine environments, things like that is very interesting to me. So I'm sure I'll learn a lot from you here today.

Tyler Black (04:33):
Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, I'm sure you'll have some insights, potentially on some of the work that I'm doing too.

Alina Baker (04:39):
So I just want to take a backtrack a bit to learn just about your educational background. I understand you did your bachelor's in toxicology here at the University of Guelph, so I'm just wondering where that interest stem from? 

Tyler Black (04:51):
Yes, it was a bit of a journey actually to get to toxicology. So I originally applied to Guelph for I think it was biomedical science and then ended up switching before I even got here, before my first year even started into microbiology, declared as Zoology minor at some point, switched completely at the end of my second year into toxicology. 
So it definitely took quite some time to actually get into toxicology to learn about what even it was, after kind of spending the first two years of my undergrad kind of lost, not sure what I wanted to do. So the interest really came from just kind of looking at other programs in my second year when I was kind of fed up with microbiology, didn't really have an interest in it. Then stumbled upon toxicology, talked to some people on the program. Yeah, I haven't looked back since. I've been super, super happy with kind of the trajectory my career has gone on. 
Then my kind of introduction into the aquatic side of things because that's really been the focus of my masters and now my PhD, happened during my fourth year. So I was looking for fourth year research project and I ended up finding a project with Dr. Paul Sibley within the School of environmental sciences, that was looking at the impacts of pesticide mixtures on Daphnia magna, and Daphnia is commonly known as the water flea, is a common test species used in aquatic testing. So yeah, since then, I've kind of fallen in love with the fields of toxicology, but also wanting to understand how contaminants impact the environment.

Alina Baker (06:45):
So Tyler, tell us a bit about your current PhD research. What is it and why exactly is it important? Why is it timely today?

Tyler Black (06:54):
Yeah, for sure. So basically, I'm looking to understand how oil spills impact marine organisms using a toxicology lens, and particularly what happens to bivalves and more specifically clams that hold ecological, economic and cultural value after they're impacted by an oil spill. So by understanding what happens to clam populations, the hope is that this will help focus restoration efforts down the road. 
So my research is seeking to kind of accomplish this in a few different ways. But first, a focal component in my research is investigating marine diesel spill that occurred in Heiltsuk territory along the central coast in what is now known as British Columbia. 
So back in 2016, the Nathan E. Stewart tugboat, ran aground and sank. This caused the release of over 110,000 liters of diesel fuel and lubricants and other petroleum products into Gale Creek. Gale Creek was the site or is the site of cultural value, and also home to commercial and subsistence clam harvesting. We're now five years after the spill, but the populations have... clams have not shown strong signs for recovering, and the community wants to know why. 
So the Heiltsuk Nation has identified some knowledge gaps pertaining to the effects of marine diesel oil on a number of plant species. My research is hoping to fill in some of those gaps and inform restoration efforts down the road. So to do this, we're taking an iterative approach to understanding what happened following the Nathan E. Stewart oil spill. 
So first off, we want to know what happened to the clam populations that are currently there. So Heiltsuk knowledge and clam abundances tell us that the populations have yet to recover. We're now approaching five years since the spill. So why is this the case? 
Could it be that the adult clams that were around at the time of the spill are just no longer able to produce viable offspring. Maybe the juvenile clams that are being produced are not making it past some of those key developmental milestones, because of some multi generation impacts that have come from the adults and carried on to their children. Or maybe the clam populations are fine, but the environment is still not viable to juvenile clams. So we aren't seeing recruitment of healthy young clams into the population. 
So those are super broadly some of the main research questions identified by the nation and that I'm looking to tackle. So we'll have to see down the road in the next year to next few years, what comes of this research and how the clam populations are faring in six, seven, eight years post spill. 
To kind of talk about the importance of this research. Clams, among other organisms, are important economically but also ecologically and culturally, so restoring these populations as quickly and appropriately as we can will be important moving forward. Now global dependence can bring us to a global context. Aquaculture, our dependence on aquaculture is increasing. So the use of finfish and both finfish and shellfish, like bivalves for food has doubled since the 90s. That trend is continuing to increase. 
But also shipping traffic is everywhere in coastal environments around the world. It's only increasing as human population increases. But so yes, we're seeing better regulation in some countries of the sector, but accidents happen and a prime example of this was the Nathan E. Stewart grounding in Heiltsuk territory, which can be attributed to things like human error and poor training and regulation. 
So in light of this and in acknowledging that accidents, like the Nathan E. Stewart drowning happened, we need to understand the impact of oil spills and how to mitigate them to prevent widespread long term damage of ecologically sensitive, economically important and culturally valued species, like intertidal clams.

Alina Baker (11:03):
That's all very interesting. I know that marine pollutants are a global issue. It affects coastal environments pretty much all over the world. So I just want to get a bit more insight into why you're studying bivalves, specifically. Why are they a good starting point for understanding the effects of these marine pollutants on coastal environments?

Tyler Black (11:30):
Yeah, for sure. So I can start off with kind of a general introduction to what bivalves are. So their name comes from the fact that they have two valves or two shells that are attached by a hinge, hence bivalve. It consists of four main groups. They include oysters, scallops, mussels, and clams. They all have kind of subtle differences about them. 
So they might vary in reproduction methods or habitat or general behavior. But super generally, they're found in marine and freshwater environments around the world, except for some exceptions like scallops and oysters that are only found in marine environments. 
They're an incredibly important food source. They tend to have as well as sessile lifestyle, meaning they don't move around much, except in the case of larvae, which are planktonic, or might be bound to a finfish host. But they're also filter feeders, so they're constantly feeding and pulling in particles in their environment, whether that be particles in the water column, on the surface of the sediment, or in pore waters, and it's going to be really important when they're in an environment where contaminants exist. 
So their body consists of a lot of lipid stores. So I'll get back to that in just a second. But, super simply, the fact that they have a lot of lipid stores and the fact that they're constantly pulling in contaminants and particles from their environment, means that they're going to eventually bio-accumulate contaminants. 
Now bio-accumulation is the uptake and accumulation of contaminants or other substances within an organism over time. Then we'll have another... something else will happen, a term called bio magnification, which is the increase in contaminant levels as you move higher up the food chain. 
So if we bring this thought to clams, let's consider a clam being exposed to several different pollutants like heavy metals or something called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. Those are combustion products that are also found in oil or other fossil fuels or other pollutants. These are all compounds that are relatively poorly soluble in the water, but are also lipophilic, meaning that they're going to be attracted to those lipids, which we know that clams are super abundant in. 
So the clam is just minding its own business and filtering away, when a contaminant like those from an oil spill enters the system. So over a period of time, it's going to be continuously pulling in the contaminant and everything else that's in that environment. So the concentration, the environment may not change, but the concentration within the organism is increasing. 
Now what happens when we go to consume these organisms? Well, we have to eat quite a lot to make up for the energy differences among trophic levels. So clams are small, you're not just going to sit down for a meal and have one clam or one mussel, you're going to be having quite a few of them, just like how whales or other predators have to in aquatic systems there, they're not going to eat one fish, they're going to eat a ton of fish. 
So we start taking in the contaminants as well that are now concentrated within the tissues of the clams or whatever we're eating, whether it be fish or mussels. Those contaminants, some of which may be quite toxic or carcinogenic, are going to affect the health of the consumer. 
So that's why under contamination scenarios or oil spills, the filter feeders are going to be kind of an indicator species of contaminants in the environment. We need to be aware of levels of contaminants in the environment, especially from a food security standpoint, especially where people are dependent on these organisms for subsistence purposes.

Talia Dyer (15:22):
I just want to pop in for a second here. I'm curious about what you've mentioned around food security and this affecting consumer health. At this point, would the bivalves be consumed as a food source currently or is nothing being harvested from this area of British Columbia as a result of the spill?

Tyler Black (15:54):
Throughout the site within Gale Creek within Heiltsuk territory, clams are not being harvested from there currently. So initially, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and government of Canada have put a ban on fishing. So harvesting of clams from the impacted areas. Since then, the CFIA has determined that they are safe for human consumption, but of course, with that, there's public perception and comfortability level as well. 
There are some general concerns within the communities rightfully so. A more thorough investigation may be warranted to kind of understand the level of oiling and the health of the clams. On top of that, the clam communities or the clan populations, it seems are not at the level that they were at before the spill. So harvesting them may not be sustainable in the long run, especially if the adults are no longer recruiting healthy juveniles in the population. So for going into an unhealthy clam bed and harvesting clams from there, even if they are safe for human consumption, it could be detrimental to the clam populations there.

Talia Dyer (17:20):
Yeah, that's really helpful. Just to take a couple of steps back as well. Could you, for those who might not be familiar with this spill, or this area, where abouts is this geographically?

Tyler Black (17:35):
Yeah, so it's right up on the Central Coast, just south of Haida Gwaii, and about two to 300 kilometers north of Vancouver and Vancouver Island. So right up on the coast, in the heart of the Great Bear rainforest.

Alina Baker (17:53):
So Tyler, I'm just wondering if you could tell us a bit more about the background of this work, like what research or current knowledge are you building on as it relates to assessing impacts associated with marine oil spills in this area, as well as globally?

Tyler Black (18:11):
Yeah, so in the past 20-30 years, there have been a number of large scale oil spills that have impacted subsistence harvesting of clams, mussels, other aquatic organisms. So we have some information to go off of based on historical oil spills like Exxon Valdez, and the spill that happened up in Prince William Sound, Alaska back in 1989, after a tanker ran aground, and following this spill, there were reported declines of harvest by almost 80%. Bivalve recovery didn't happen up until 10 to 15 years ago. 
But the thing about oil spills is that every oil spill is different. There are no set ways of responding to them. And there was no textbook that we can reference on. What will happen to biota immediately after and for the years that followed oil spills. This is because oil spills are dependent on the conditions at the time of the spill. So severity of oiling of animals and surfaces is going to depend on wind, currents, wave action. 
State and behavior is dependent on something like rain or temperature, or the type of sediment in the area. Then all of these factors are dependent on location. Then on top of that, different locations are going to have varying concentrations of organisms, habitat types, sensitivities and so on. Then to top it all off, organism life stages have varying sensitivities.
So if an oil spill happens when fish are spawning or when clams are spawning, the impacts are likely going to be greater because juvenile fish and clams are less resilient to contaminants in most cases. Unfortunately, the Nathan E. Stewart grounding happened directly adjacent to one of the most productive clam fisheries in the territory. Conditions at the time of the spill, among other things, contributed to poor oil recovery, and widespread oiling throughout Gale Creek and into these clam beds and intertidal environments. 
So this is all to say that we really don't have much to go off of in terms of historical spills. But we can use research around historical spills as a starting point. But in terms of oil spills in the Central Coast and affecting clam beds, we don't have much to go off of just because of those location based and condition based differences that are going to strongly dictate what happens following an oil spill.

Alina Baker (20:31):
There you mentioned an intertidal environment. I'm just curious about what exactly that is, is that where bivalves reside? Is that their habitat in the ocean? Can you tell us a bit about intertidal environments?

Tyler Black (20:46):
Yes, not all bivalves reside in intertidal environments. But the ones that we're focused on, particularly a few clams species that we're working with, and that are of importance and of interest to the Nation, live in intertidal zones. So intertidal zones are just that. So at low tide, they are not covered by water. They're open, exposed to the air, and then at high tides, they are underwater. 
So this provides kind of an interesting environment for a suite of species and it's home to many species, including things like barnacles, crabs, mussels, and clams, sea stars, sea urchins, and so on. So it's a thriving, productive environment.

Alina Baker (21:40):
So your research, more or less, seeks to develop a framework really for assessing the impacts of these spills on bivalves, right? So I'm just wondering will this framework, once it's completed, will this be applicable globally and to the different types of marine and coastal environment under different conditions that you spoke about earlier?

Tyler Black (22:06):
Yeah, so that's exactly the hope. I had mentioned that we really don't have much to go off of when it comes to investigating the impacts of oil spills, to clam beds or to other organisms. Because yeah, every oil spill is different. But by developing a framework, kind of a set of steps that researchers can follow to investigate what happened to their clam beds, or mussel populations, or whatever. It could be something used by communities, spill responders, countries, or nations around the world. 
So yeah, the hope is we can create kind of a tool, this set of steps that worked for this oil spill, and the hope is that it can be applied more globally. Yeah, it's just kind of going back to that global scale of things. Oil spills happen, they happen around the world. Ships run aground, I mean, shipping traffic is ubiquitous, and everywhere across the globe. Because of that, we need to understand the long term impacts of oil spills on food resources, and we're seeing pretty large increase in, as I mentioned before, on shellfish as a food source, and as human populations increases, land use increases, we're going to see an even greater reliance on aquaculture and systems like that.

Alina Baker (23:36):
Right. So I can imagine that a lot of this types of research and efforts really help to inform restoration efforts. But I'm wondering from your experience, and from learning more about this area, what would you say are some of the main barriers to recovery from these populations?

Tyler Black (23:53):
So it largely depends on a system that has been impacted. So if you have an aquatic system that gets oil, but doesn't have much in terms of tides, or water movement to really flush anything out, you're going to have residual oil pile up and persist. Then when adults get impacted, those impacts are going to potentially persist into future generations. So we have this kind of confounding impact and the ball is just going to roll further down the hill, and we're going to see those persistent impacts. 
So by kind of taking this iterative approach that I talked about, in terms of a step by step, is it the adult? Is it that juveniles? Is the sediment in the environment? We can really narrow in on what, specifically for the Nathan E Stewart oil spill, those barriers to recovery are.

Alina Baker (24:57):
All right. I understand that the last few days to a few weeks were pretty busy for you. I know you just returned from Bella Bella in British Columbia, doing field research. So what insight did you get from that experience? We're all curious to know.

Tyler Black (25:17):
Yeah. So yeah, over the past week and a half to two weeks, I had the opportunity to go to Bella Bella in Heiltsuk territory to meet some of knowledge holders and help out with some field research relating to the impacted clam bed. That was my second time out on the west coast. So it was really great to go back out there. The first time I went out there, we just went to Vancouver and then down to Seattle. So it was nice to explore that more of the West Coast. 
This is my first time doing field work out in kind of a marine setting. So it was a whole different ballgame for me. Coming from a background in freshwater research relating to inland boreal lakes up in Northern Ontario, to heading out to the west coast is a huge transition. We're working in intertidal zones. Again, intertidal zones, the access to them varies with tides. 
So that was a whole new element to work with that we've never had to deal with in freshwater systems where the tide window is between six and eight in the morning. So that means we have to jump on the boat at 5am and do an hour boat ride to make that tide window. 
Whereas working in freshwater systems, if you're delayed by two hours or something happens and you can't get out until the afternoon, that's fine because you really don't have to worry about tides in lake systems, especially small boreal lakes that are only a few meters deep. So that was definitely something that that was new to me. 
Then we'd be out on one of the clam beaches, doing some work. I turned away for like two minutes and then the water's slowly encroaching from all sides. So definitely something to get used to, and from growing up in Ontario and never being exposed to tidal environments and the ocean, it's so different. 
I mean, if you talk to someone from the west coast, they'd not the experience that they had, that they would have had, and they probably just look at you, like, "What are you talking about? This is the normal part of my life." Yeah, so very, very awesome to be out there and to meet those that I'm collaborating with and the Heiltsuk Integrated Resource Management Department who's leading in some of this work and kind of informing some of the questions that I'm looking to tackle.

Alina Baker (28:16):
So Tyler, I'm just curious to know a bit more about the lab setup that you guys have at the University of Guelph. What are your plans with the clams that you guys traveled from thousands of miles with?

Tyler Black (28:28):
Yeah, so over the past year, I've been working to set up a kind of a clam recirculation system. So that's the system that will constantly filter out the water into clam tanks. Then yeah, basically just a system that we can hold the clams until we run toxicological tests on them. So we've been working with the folks at the Hagen Aqualab, right on the University of Guelph campus. 
So over the past few months, I've developed this system that's going to house all of the clams that we've brought over from Heiltsuk territory, and from Gale Creek. The plan is with the clams that we currently have is to tackle that question around the adult clam population. So I mentioned before, but we want to understand kind of the first step of that iterative process. What is happening with the adult clam populations? Are they able to reproduce and are they able to reproduce viable offspring? So that's the question I'm tackling right now. 
So we'll be moving the clams, they're currently in kind of a quarantine within one of our labs before we move them over to this general system where I have other clams on there, just to make sure there's no pathogens or any other health issues that they'll carry over to the healthy clams that we currently have. So once they're there, my plan is to induce them to spawn. 
So we have collected clams from various impacted sites, as well as the reference sites up in Heiltsuk territory. We want to do comparisons between the reference and impacted sites, but also understand the health of the offspring that they produce. So we're going to try and get conditions as close as possible to the conditions that they would experience in the natural environment, but also encourage them to spawn. There are different ways we can do that, through different temperature fluctuations, but also introducing excess amounts of food. 
So my plan is to attempt that and then collect the gametes and then collect the fertilized eggs and then track development of the larvae over 30 days and beyond to see if there are any developmental malformations or any other issues that would ultimately prevent the juveniles from successfully being recruited into the clam populations and going on to be reproductively successful themselves. 
So that's kind of the focus right now and why we needed our own system on the University of Guelph campus. I'm super excited about that the system is up and running. It took many months and lots of work to get up and running. But we can now successfully hold marine intertidal clams on campus.

Alina Baker (31:53):
That's so cool. I can't even imagine the amount of work and research it took to get to that point of having like a fully functional living lab. So that's great. I'm just wondering, are there any kind of new questions that are arising or just popping up in your mind as you're in this kind of preliminary stage of your research?

Tyler Black (32:18):
Yeah, I mean, right off the bat, like having a chance to do some of this clam rearing and in keeping them alive. There have been questions relating to some of those practices and how we can optimize it better. Some of the species we're working with have never really successfully been cultured in a lab setting. We're struggling with one of the species right now. But the hope is that potentially we can work towards successfully culturing them and bringing them in to do some of this toxicity testing, with the hopes of improving populations of this specific clam species moving forward. 
So that was one of the questions that we have is can we successfully rear and keep alive this one species in a lab setting? Then, yeah, from there, there's some other questions that have popped up about different kind of exposure scenarios we can try to replicate with respect to diesel oil in a lab setting. Yeah, I'm excited to kind of see where this goes. 
It's still in some of the earliest stages, but I'm sure two or three years from now, as I start writing, all these other questions will pop up, and I'll be eager to get back into the lab to answer them. Meanwhile, my advisors will be trying to get me out and finished and have my thesis readY and out, but that I'll be like getting caught up in all this other stuff, but yeah, excited to see where this research shows, and I'm sure it's going to be super impactful and beneficial on a global scale, is the hope.

Talia Dyer (34:11):
I just want to backtrack a little bit to talking about the life cycle of the bivalves. So you've referenced juveniles and adults. So what is the reproductive and spawning sort of cycle and juvenile cycle and sort of adult cycle? What's that timeline? Are you talking a few months? Are you talking several months, a few days?

Tyler Black (34:43):
Bivalves, more broadly, each of those kind of four groups, the mussels, clams, oysters, scallops, all have subtle variations. Even within them, there're even more variations. Like some freshwater mussel species require a finfish host. So they require this gills of a fish for development. But the species that I'm working with, the various clam species, they're a bit more different, they don't require another fish host for development. 
So I'll talk about the Manila clam because they're commercially abundant species. So for the Manila clam, you have gametes released into the open environment. So you have sperm and egg released into the open environment at specific times of the year. So usually when it's most warm, and there's an influx of food that allow for gametogenesis. So that's the development of gametes within the adult clam. 
Then when it's time, they'll release those gametes, so either the sperm or the egg, into the open water where the eggs will get fertilized. Then after about 24 to 48 hours, you have the development of something called D-larvae. So their shell that kind of looks like a D, and then over time, over the next seven days, it will start to develop into a swimming stage. 
So this is where they're not sessile, they're actually planktonic, which means they kind of move freely with the currents and in tides and all of that. So they're not buried into the sediment or wherever. But within that seven to 14 day window, we have something called settlement that occurs. So the clam or the mussel or whatever organism will go and find a nice grain of sand or a rocky surface to settle on. So they'll attach to it and then that's where they'll spend most of their juvenile development. 
So they'll get larger and larger, they'll lose their ability to swim freely. Yeah, that's kind of where the adult stage comes about. Depending on the species, they can reach reproductive age, within a year. And then the whole process starts over again.

Talia Dyer (37:27):
Yeah, that's really fascinating. You mentioned that there are a few clam species that you were working with. Are you able to identify those? And are these all native clam species? So to say.

Tyler Black (37:42):
Yeah, so I'm working with three species for now. That were identified as important ecologically or economically or culturally to the Heiltsuk nation. Yeah, these were the three species that I was asked to work with. The two of them are native. They're the butter clam, and the Nuttall's cockle. They have been used for generations, for subsistence purposes, as well as the Manila clam, which is the primary commercially harvested species, not only on the Central Coast, but around the world. 
The Manila clam is actually invasive. It came from Asia, back in the 1930s, 1940s. And was introduced to the central coast and the west coast in general, ranging from California all the way up to the central coast, sometime within the 30s to 50s. Since then it's become commercially important for a number of communities, for British Columbia, for Washington State, and so on.

Talia Dyer (38:59):
That's really fascinating. Thanks for clarifying those points.

Alina Baker (39:05):
So Tyler, what advice do you have, potentially, for aspiring researchers or just anyone interested in learning more about this topic?

Tyler Black (39:14):
Yes, it's going to sound like super cliché, and probably something they have heard billions of times now. But the most important thing is to read and ask questions and talk to the researchers in the field, email me, send a message to other researchers, and odds are that they'll be more than happy to talk about their research, and you probably won't be able to get them to shut up about it. Like, kind of what comes about some of those conversations. 
I mean, well also research itself can be pretty depressing and frustrating at times. But it's also interesting just because of how complex it is. So it may seem daunting at first in getting started or figuring out where to even start in the first place. But that really is half the battle. So ask questions and talk to people doing this work and you'll never know what opportunities are going to come out from that.

Alina Baker (40:04):
Right. I know like, in terms of just how Canada as a nation is kind of laid out, not many people would be even aware of the types of devastation that marine environments face because they're just not familiar with marine environments or communities that are near to coastal environments. So that's interesting that you say like, just to ask questions, like once you're interested in something, or it seems like something that you would be willing to work towards making better globally, and within Canada, asking questions is really a good starting point. 
Yeah, that advice isn't just only for aspiring researchers, but just for interested residents of Canada or just people, like as you say, like where it's projected that we'll start to depend more on marine environments and the fisheries industry, like just as humans, as a source of nutrients and things like that. So becoming involved through asking questions is so important for our listeners as well.

Tyler Black (41:12):
Yeah, so the most important thing is to be aware of the issues that are out there and educate yourselves. I mean, we're polluting our environment at an alarming rate, and ultimately, all of this is going to be compounded by climate change. The thing is that oil spills are preventable and are happening because of poor regulation, because of lack of oversight, a lack of training, and then they're perpetuated and amplified by financial interests, and we can change that. 
I mean, on the oil spill front, it's important to learn about historical oil spills, what we learned, what we didn't learn, and what mistakes we keep making, and why oil spills are happening. Then take that knowledge and educate those around you. Like your family or friends or your uncle who follows too much on Facebook. Then finally your frustration to action. So speak to your representatives about contaminants issues in your area. 
Really the only way we can prevent the next oil spill from happening is with immediate and concrete action. So vote for members of parliament that are committed to making a difference on issues that matter to you, and then going back to that research element, if you're interested in getting into research, do it with intent. There's room for objectivity in science, but the work that you publish and the research that you do is going to have societal impacts. That's because science is inherently political and policymakers are going to be listening to the science that is out there. So be aware of the context of your work, if you want to do good, impactful science.

Alina Baker (42:54):
that's great advice, Tyler. As we come down to the close of this episode, something we like to do is to ask our guests to give a shout out. So is there anyone or anything that you'd like to give a shout out to at this time?

Tyler Black (43:07):
Yeah, for sure. So first of all, we're actually looking to bring on another student or postdoc to this project, to look at the toxic effects of rain, diesel, oil on clams. So if you're listening, and any of this has piqued your interest at all, don't hesitate to reach out to myself or one of my advisors, Dr. Prosser, who's based in the School of Environmental Sciences, to ask questions and learn about the project. We'd be more than happy to discuss it with you. 
I'd also like to give a huge shout out to everyone I've worked with up at the University of Manitoba and the International Institute for Sustainable Development Experimental Lakes Area in Northern Ontario, and especially my master's advisor Dr. Mark Hansen. Without his and everyone else's support there, there's no way I would be where I am. So thank you times a million.
Then to Dr. Ryan Prosser and Dr. Kyle Artelle, my current co-advisors for my PhD. You guys have been so supportive especially amid the pandemic, and to have your support has meant the world. So thank you so much. To the Heiltsuk Nation for trusting us with answering these research questions and providing support. I am excited to see where this research leads.

Alina Baker (44:25):
Well thank you Tyler for taking the time today to share this interesting and very timely and crucial research with us today. It's been great. I'm sure Talia and I learned so much from you. We're just hopeful that this research can really be put to use to helping to restore bivalve populations.

Tyler Black (44:47):
Yeah, thank you so much for having me. It's been an absolute pleasure talking with you both today. Yeah, I'm excited to talk to anyone who's interested in any of this work. Yeah, at the end of the day, I'm super excited to see where this goes and I am hoping we can have a pretty substantial positive impact.

Alina Baker (45:09):
The Why and How podcast is published by the Ontario Agricultural College of the University of Guelph. It is produced by Jordan Terpstra and Talia Dyer. Recording and editing by Jakub Hyzyk and Kyle Ritchie. The host is me, Alina Baker. If you liked what you heard, be sure to leave us a review and subscribe. Thanks for listening.