Teagan Johnson fell in love with marine science at the age of 14.
After attending a two-week camp at University of North Carolina Wilmington, she was intrigued by marine mammals and the possibilities of ocean research.
It's a passion that stuck with Johnson, attracting her to the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science, where she is now a rising senior studying marine science and biology.
This summer she got an up close look at her favorite topic—marine mammals— as an intern at the Alaska SeaLife Center. The three-month experience marks her first time in the state, where, each day, Johnson helps to feed and train harbor, spotted, and ringed seals and steller sea lions, and conducts research on them. She also offers enrichment activities to the animals and leads daily education sessions about the seals.
"I never thought I'd be in Alaska for three months working with marine mammals, so it's been a surreal and amazing experience," she said. "I am really enjoying it—I don't even mind getting up early to make meals for the animals, and since it is summer, it is sunny all the time in Alaska."
Johnson is one of many University of Miami students whoi did internships this summer and is also a recipient of The Mark and Maureen Angelo Family Endowment Fund—an application-based scholarship offered through the Toppel Career Center to help cover the cost of low-paid or unpaid internships.
She shared a bit about the experience.
How did you find this internship?
Alaska SeaLife Center does research and posts a lot on Instagram. So, I was interested in some sea lion research they do, and on their website, I noticed they had internships. Applications were due in December, so I worked on mine during the fall semester and found out in the spring.
Where are you living this summer?
The Alaska SeaLife Center offers its interns dorm-style living in Seward, a southern coastal city where the center is located, so I am sharing an apartment with five other interns. Seward is about two and a half hours south of Anchorage, and it's a walkable city, so I walk or carpool to work. In my free time, I can hike or go down to the harbor near Resurrection Bay and see native seals, sea lions, whales, orcas, and sea otters. I've also seen moose, puffins, and plenty of bald eagles.
Are you on a team?
I am one of three interns on the marine mammal team, of about 20 total interns at the center.
What's a typical day like?
I'll go in early for fish prep, which includes making meals for all the animals. We have to sort through all the frozen fish and stuff vitamins into some of the food for the seals and sea lions. Then, we feed the seals, squid, herring, and capelin, while we feed our sea lions herring, pollock, and capelin. Capelin is a very watery, small fish that they can swallow whole, and it is important for seals and sea lions to stay hydrated.
After that, I often do training and research studies. Currently, I'm learning how to train seals by understanding the basic behaviors they know. Now, I know how to hand-feed them and how to behave when I am holding food because some seals are big and fast. I am also learning how to read animal behavior and what their cues are to see if they are motivated for training or not.
We also do a lot of cool research with seals. One project is called PHOCAS for the physiology and health of cooperating arctic seals. It's a neat project because we do a lot of measurements called morphometrics (looking at the length of seals and their girth because that fluctuates throughout the lifespan and seasons). This will help scientists know how large a healthy seal is supposed to be at different ages. We take photos of animals on a meter stick and also do blubber ultrasounds at seven points along the animals to gauge how the thickness of their blubber changes through the seasons. We are also doing a metabolic study about how much energy they use while resting, swimming, and diving in the water.
How do you think this experience will benefit your college and career journey?
It's giving me a lot of really good connections and has offered me a lot of great experience with husbandry, or animal care, and how it works in a place like the Alaska SeaLife Center. The internship has also given me an understanding about how to deal with marine mammals overall.
How does this fit into your broader professional goals?
I would be interested in continuing this work here or at other sea life centers. I would also love to work with dolphins and sea turtles, but since I have just had this experience with seals and sea lions, I'm interested in where it could lead.
After graduation, I'd probably want to work at a place like this, or the Georgia Aquarium, or SeaWorld. Since we work closely with the Joseph M. Long Marine Laboratory in California, working there would also be very exciting.
