Monthly Newsletter

January 2026

This newsletter includes the following topics: 

Greetings to the Shoals Community,

 

January has always been a time of transition for me. Because I have never left higher education, I have always enjoyed the break during the holidays to reset and get ready for the next year. At Shoals, I feel a bigger transition from the end of last year to the formal beginning of the next.  This month we have begun building the seasonal staff team for 2026, we have reserved the Gulf Challenger for our whale watches and garden tours, and we are working to develop a new system to help with boat manifests, numbers of people at each meal (and known dietary restrictions) and housing.

 

I know many people use the new year to make resolutions about changes they want to make in their lives.  As a true confession, I gave up making new year’s resolutions years (decades) ago.  The number of resolutions I have made and have then been unable to complete (often ending in January) is something I don’t want to count.  However, I still think the new year is a great time to reflect on prior goals and to establish a new set of goals for the future.

 

I keep a running list of personal and professional goals.  My hope is to accomplish at least 3 of my goals each year.  I don’t share the list broadly but rather share with others who might be able to help with a specific goal when it becomes a likelihood.  However, I fully believe in celebrating all successes, so I like to celebrate the goals I achieved in the prior year.  In 2024, one of my goals was to be slimed by a hagfish. After decades of hearing about hagfish, and even teaching about them in my vertebrate biology courses, I had the opportunity to go hagfishing with Doug Fudge, an SML faculty member who is an expert on hagfish and a mentee of JB Heiser and Ric Martini, earlier SML hagfish experts.  Then, I was able to experience hagfish slime with his Investigative Marine Biology class. It was awesome.  That year, I also was able to go on my first shark fishing trip (and we caught a porbeagle) and to paddleboard around Appledore, which I did several times.

 

Last year, I accomplished three of my personal goals. I was hoping to be better about keeping records of the birds that I saw on Appledore and on field trips.  While I didn’t do it every day, I managed to submit a total of 94 eBird checklists from Appledore, other islands in the Isles of Shoals, and boat trips, which was the most I had ever submitted. Other highlights include two additional shark fishing trips when we caught sharks (a porbeagle and an 8-foot blue), banding my first tern chicks on White Island (Common Tern), and handling a woodcock captured in the banding station’s nets.

 

I don’t have a specific set of goals for 2026, but rather I have a series of goals that I would like to accomplish in the next several years.  The only future goal I’m willing to share at this time is the hope to be able to visit Appledore every month of the year.  Because of my many years on the island studying migration and teaching, I have been on Appledore during seven different months (April through October) before beginning as executive director.  This year, I added December. It was great fun to be on the island when Crystal Lake was frozen.  I expect this goal will be one that takes several more years to accomplish.  It also provides adventures to anticipate in the future.

 

I know the storm that hit us has impacted many members of our community.  I hope you all are staying warm and safe!

 

Wishing you all the best in 2026,

Liz Craig, Director of Seabird Research, Academic Coordinator

One of my personal goals for summer 2025 was to improve my fishing (and fish fileting) skills, and I definitely got some practice last year! I greatly enjoyed sharing the experience of catching, preparing, and eating seafood with SML students and seasonal staff during their visits to the SML outpost on White Island throughout the summer. Highlights from the White Island kitchen included fried tusk sandwiches, grilled pollock and mackerel, mackerel pizza (don’t knock it ‘til you try it!), and one serendipitous soft-shelled green crab. I hope to do more fishing and foraging with a new batch of Shoalers in the coming year! 

Wendy Goldstein, Senior Program Support Assistant

I own a few Victorian and Edwardian costumes from a past era of my life, and I have no place to wear them anymore. However, since starting my employment at Shoals Marine Lab three years ago, I have been threatening/promising to dress up as Celia Thaxter and wander around the island just for kicks. I am neither an actor nor an extrovert, mind you, so this was very much outside of my comfort zone, which is perhaps why it took me so long to follow through.

This July I finally made the effort to lug the outfit, petticoat, and other accoutrements to the island and, with much coaching from Terry, impersonated Celia during two of our Celia Thaxter Garden Tours. After my initial social anxiety, it was great fun! Wearing silk during a maritime summer day was a challenge, and lace parasols provide less shade than you may think. However, I enjoyed posing for photos with guests and allowing myself to play dress up, which was one of my favorite things to do as a child.

I am glad I took the opportunity and overcame my anxiety. I credit the supportive community on the island with making a safe space for me to reacquaint myself with childhood fun. 

Amy Fish, Director of Community Relations

As the Director of Community Relations at SML, my initial goal in attending all the garden tours last summer was to educate attendees about the exciting rebuild of Celia Thaxter’s historic cottage on Appledore Island. What I didn’t anticipate was how valuable the experience would become in other ways—meeting visitors from all over with diverse motivations for coming to the island broadened my perspective on our community’s reach and impact. The tours also immersed me in the work of the incredible marine docents who lead these experiences; their passion and expertise make them true partners in our shared mission to strengthen community connections and promote marine education. I am deeply grateful for the countless opportunities our staff have to grow, learn, and connect on Appledore Island - experiences that continually enrich both our work and our sense of community. 

Sara Morris, John M. Kingsbury Executive Director

For those of us who live on Appledore over the summer, we try to make the most of the island setting in our "time off."  In 2024, I brought my paddleboard out to the island hoping that I would be able to circumnavigate Appledore.  I promised Matt that I would always have my radio and cell phone, wear my pfd that also has a whistle, and choose appropriate sea conditions.  After successfully paddling around Appledore multiple times that summer, I decided that I wanted to paddle to each of the islands in the Isles of Shoals.  My original hope was to make the trips over two summers, knowing that the sea conditions would have to be chosen with particular care for trips to Duck, White, Seavey, and Square Rock on a paddleboard.  To my surprise and pleasure, I managed to paddle to each of the islands (individually) last summer.  Yes, I was careful with sea states, and, no, I did not fall off the paddleboard.  Goal achieved--Isles of Shoals Bingo by paddleboard!

What do you get when you combine an amazing seabird biologist studying the breeding seabirds in the Isles of Shoals and an executive director who has been banding birds for more than 40 years and who is a guillemot superfan? Shoals gets an enthusiasm for expanding the study of guillemots, which seem to be increasing in numbers in the Shoals. In 2024, team guillemot began discussing banding guillemots with field readable bands like we have been doing with gulls and terns over the last 20+ years. These colored bands allow researchers to identify individuals without having to recapture them and also provide opportunities for so many Shoals visitors to help us with resightings of individuals and thus contribute to the study of our guillemot population. In addition to adding these bands to the protocol for the chicks, the team decided to try to catch a couple of adult guillemots.  On July 25, a team was out on Smuttynose, deployed Liz's guillemot trap, and caught our first adult guillemot.  It was a truly special moment for Liz and Sara to be there together and to share first adult capture and banding. Next year, we can begin looking for guillemots wearing these new fancy green bands.  

Storm Fern recently impacted broad swaths of the country with extreme cold, sleet, and snow. We hope you are all safe and sound. After a storm like this, most people think about shoveling their walkways and drives, but did you know that the SML staff also must shovel the snow off of our boats? Zach and Matt have been working hard to clear close to 2 feet of snow from the R/V John M. Kingsbury.

During the offseason, the SML staff (and many of our community) stay connected to the islands through our webcams.  Often we get emails and texts about birds that people see from the cameras.  This picture from our research camera on Seavey Island shows a Snowy Owl sheltering in a seabird nest monitoring plot.  It also shows some of the churning of the ocean waters, highlighting why it is great to have the webcams and not have to land on the island to document the visitors during some of the bitter winter weather. Click below for a direct link to our public webcams. 

The generosity of the SML community has been on full display as we have tried to raise $6 million in honor of SML's 60th season.  We were hesitant about this large a goal as Sara, Amy, and Wendy were beginning to work together and get to know the UNH and Cornell advancement teams better. However, the amazing group of Shoals supporters has been extremely generous, and we are proud to share that as of December 31, 2025, we have raised $5,729,439, and we still have a year to meet our goal. This substantial support includes current use gifts, donations to existing endowments, the creation of new endowed funds, and several planned gifts, supporting scholarships, research, migration banding station, facilities and sustainability, Celia's garden, and operations. 

In the past, SML would have an annual meeting for all community members at the Cornell campus.  In the interest of engaging as many of our members as possible in future discussions, we have moved our meetings to ZOOM.  This meeting is open to any members of the SML community who would like to get an overview of the 2025 season and to ask questions of SML Executive Director Sara Morris.

Please join us on Thursday, February 26, 7:00 p.m. 

for a recap of our 2025 season by Sara Morris. 

Click the button below to join the meeting.

Shoals Marine Laboratory is jointly operated by the

University of New Hampshire and Cornell University.

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