South African Internship is Like Living Shark Week

Victoria Piechnik ’18 teared up a bit the first time she saw a great white shark on one of the Oceans Research boats, a shark that found its way there after Piechnik chummed the water and wrestled it with a bait rope. She wasn’t scared though — instead she was living out a childhood dream.

“I’ve wanted to see one ever since I was young,” said Piechnik, a marine science–biology major. “It seriously feels like I’m living shark week.”

Piechnik is an intern with Oceans Research, which pairs students with marine biologists to assist with their research in southern Africa on a wide variety of marine life, including great white sharks. Piechnik performs research in an aquarium as well as at sea, collecting data that is used “to advise various industries, including the government, on real-time issues in marine conservation,” according to Oceans Research.

Piechnik has been assisting several doctoral students in their field research, including tagging and tracking movement of great whites.

“We go out on the boat, chum the water, bait rope the sharks in to get their dorsal fin out of the water and photo ID them,” she said. “This research helps us establish the population of the area in Mossel Bay, which sharks are here during which season. With that we can educate the swimmers and surfers when to avoid certain parts of the water with high shark populations to ensure humans and sharks can coexist peacefully.”

Piechnik performed predator/prey research of great whites near Seal Island by towing a decoy at different times of the day and recording when breaches or prey kills occurred. She also has surveyed seals at the island, has tracked dolphins and whales by land, recording the size and coordinates of the pods, and has examined benthic sharks, such as pajama sharks and smooth hound sharks, at the aquarium by researching their movement in response to prey.

“Easy to say we were always really busy,” said Piechnik, of Greenport, NY.

She found out about the internship from previous participant Jenna Burgess ’17. In addition, fellow Spartan Anna Ferreira ’17 is an intern this summer with Piechnik. On her weekends off, they have traveled around South Africa, including to Schotia, a game reserve where they went on safari and learned about the animals from an up-close perspective.

“Academically this internship really helped me decide what career path I want to pursue. I've gained so much experience doing field research and data collection that I didn't have previously,” she said. “Initially before coming here I thought I just wanted to pursue research, but it steered me in the direction of either pursuing a career as a professor to be able to educate others about science or going to vet school and to be able to make a difference helping animals. Personally, this entire experience helped me grow so much as an individual.”

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