Biologist Heather Hamlin leaves the safety of the lab for her first field assignment: tagging alligators.
Heather Hamlin earned her BS in Biology, and an MS in Marine Bio-resources from the University of Maine before working as a Senior Biologist at Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota Florida. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of Florida in 2007, and then worked as a post-doctoral scholar at the same institution studying the effects of environmental pollutants on the endocrine system of aquatic animals. In 2010 she joined the Medical University of South Carolina’s School of Medicine as an Assistant Professor examining how contaminants can alter maternal-fetal health. Eager to get back to Maine, she returned in 2011 to the University of Maine’s School of Marine Sciences, where she is an associate professor. Heather’s current research seeks to understand how human-induced changes in the environment, whether it be climate change, ocean acidification, or pollutants can affect the reproduction and development of aquatic animals, many of which are important to Maine’s economy.
This story originally aired on June 21, 2019 in an episode titled “Strength.”
Story Transcript
A number of years ago I was part of a research group that studied American alligators. That probably sounds really exciting but the most exciting part of that for me was being able to work with Lou. He was the head of the lab. To say I worshipped him is probably a bit of an understatement and it wasn’t because he was a great scientist, it wasn’t just because he was famous in his field, it wasn’t because he won the Heinz award, which is like the Nobel Prize for environmental research. It was really because he was an amazing mentor. When he said we were family, he really meant it.
So he lovingly liked to refer to our group as the innies and the outies. The innies basically spent all their time in the lab and studied the alligators from the skin in. The outies spent all of their time in the field and studied the alligators from the skin out. So I was an innie through and through, a complete lab rat. And although I really appreciated hearing the stories of the outies, it was well outside my comfort zone.
These things, they could kill you. And so people would say, “Oh, you work with alligators. That must be dangerous.” I kind of laugh because by the time I saw them they were in test tubes and I’m analyzing some part of their blood or something like that. So unless I’m wearing open-toed shoes or violating some other lab safety protocol, I’m probably going to make it through the day. So that’s good.
But this day was a little bit different. I was part of research group that we were trying to understand the effects of space shuttle launches on surrounding wildlife. The Kennedy Space Center is smack dab in the middle of Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge and so we were trying to understand if any of the rocket launches and the rocket fuel, etcetera, and all these things that could happen.
This particular day, all of a sudden Lou decided that I would make a good outie. So they were missing a person so he kind of went through the lab and he was like, “Oh, so you can come help us out in this field research.”
In this particular research we were studying adult alligators. Our mission, as he was explaining it to me, is that we were going to take these barbless grappling hooks, so if you're like a robber and you're going up a building, so imagine that, and then they're attached to Kevlar rope so we have this whole thing tied up in a bucket, we’re going to take this and we’re going to throw it and we’re going to hook an alligator. We’re going to pull it onto the land and then we’re going to hold it still while we take blood samples and we’re going to let it go.
I’m like, “What could possibly go wrong, pray to God.” But it’s an opportunity for me to spend time with Lou so I said, “Yes. Certainly, I'll do this thing.”
Our team consisted of Lou and matt, his grown son, his adult son who had done many of these before and was clearly a really competent outie, and Russ who was our NASA collaborator who was in charge of all of the field expeditions that we did and was, by all accounts, fearless. So even though this seemed dangerous, I was really excited to be a part of this really competent crew.
So I listened really intently to everything they were telling me and everything that was going to happen because I wanted to make sure where am I going to basically be able to be the most help. I was really good at bleeding alligators so I’m just trying to figure, “Okay, where can I be helpful in this group?”
But the whole time I’m thinking, “How on earth are these guys going to wrangle an alligator?” I mean an adult male alligator is like 10 or 11 feet, 500 or 600 pounds and all these guys are big but they are not alligator-big. So I’m like, “All right. It would be really interesting to see what happens.”
And what we were doing on that particular day was something called running ditches, which is about as glamorous as it sounds. Merritt Island is covered in all these dirt roads. It’s a high-security area so that vehicles can access basically all the landmass. And all along these dirt roads are tons of these really deep and wide ditches. So we were running these ditches to find alligators to take samples from.
So we’re driving along in the truck and the very first stop of the day, we look across this big ditch and on the other side there are five or six maybe smaller adults and then one huge alligator. As soon as the truck doors open, the alligators just take off into the water.
I grab the bucket with the grappling hook and the Kevlar rope thinking I'll carry this for someone. I get out of the truck and I stand there and, within seconds, I’m all by myself. The guys have taken off in either direction. I can’t see them anymore. They're in the brush somewhere presumably trying to find, maybe predict, where these alligators went. I was like, “Okay, there must be some kind of competition who’s going to catch it first.”
So I stood there and I went, “Well, the blood sample stuff is in the truck so I guess I'll just kind of wait here until they come back and then I'll be helpful. In the meantime, I’m just going to hang here.”
I’m standing there and I’m looking at the water and all of a sudden I see this giant alligator head 20-feet from me just kind of pops up. I’m like, “Oh, my God. Oh, my God.”
Presumably, it’s that big one that everybody was trying to catch so I’m like, “Guys, guys,” they can hear me, and I’m like, “I see it. It’s right in front of me.”
I’m super excited and I hear Russ from off at a distance and he says, “Well, catch it. You idiot, what are you yelling to me for?”
I waited for a second. I was expecting to hear like a thunder of feet or the snapping of branches or any indication that he was just kidding and that they were on their way back to help me. I know Lou heard it. Nothing. Complete silence.
Then it occurred to me. They actually expect me to catch this thing. Then I thought about it more and I’m like, “Lou is really smart. This must mean I can catch this thing.” I’m like, “I’m going to catch me a gator.”
So I grab my bucket and I walk over and I take my grappling hook. I’m like, “Okay, I paid attention, right?” I had really paid attention to what they told me to do.
So I took this thing and I swung it like I was supposed to and tried to hook it right where I was supposed to. As soon as it hit the water, the alligator went down. So I pulled it back, I pulled it back, and I threw it at about the same place it was because I was thinking if that whole group of people didn’t make this thing move, I certainly wasn’t.
So I threw this thing and I kind of felt a little bit of a tug, so I just pulled back for all it was worth. As soon as I did that, the rope just starts flying out of my bucket and I’m like, “Oh, my God. Oh, my God.”
I have these leather gloves on and I’m gripping as hard as I can. It’s like I am not even there and the rope is just flying out of my bucket. I can tell that the rope, where it is in the water, isn’t moving its position and so the alligator is death rolling. So it’s death rolling under the water and it’s just wrapping itself on this rope.
As it slows down a little, I try and wrap my hand around it so I can pull something back and then I just hold on and hope for the best. By the time it stopped, I was a little closer to the water than I was comfortable with, so I kind of grab and dug in and went back up onto the land as far as I could until I really couldn’t move anymore but I was pretty impressed with the kind of headway I made.
Then I was like, “Russ, I got it.”
All of a sudden, I hear, “Holy cow!” Then all of a sudden I hear all the sounds of things that I was expecting before. I hear the thunder of feet just crashing from both directions and they came up and then everybody grabs the rope. It took four of us pulling as hard as we could. Now I really understand why they needed four to pull this thing up.
As it’s coming up, you can start to see it break the water and then you can start to see how big it is and it was huge. This was a 10-foot alligator. Matt, the one that was helping us out was like, “Nice!”
I’m like, “Yeah, I did that. Whatever. It’s fine.”
So we pull it up and Russ jumps on it and clamps its jaws shut so someone can duct tape it then we bring it up onto the land. We’re bringing it up and so I’m really excited that we’re going to get to bleed this. Then Russ starts to stand up and he's like, “All right. Hop on. Keep this thing stable while I go get the supplies.”
I look behind me and there's nobody there. He was talking to me. I’m like, “Okay.” And I was like, “Well, why me?”
Then he was like, “Well, it’s your gator.”
I’m like, “Yeah. It’s my gator.”
So I walk over and so the protocol with what you're supposed to do to maintain its position to keep it stable is just to straddle it, which I did. You straddle its back then you take its feet and you put it over your heels. So you're kind of like this, your heels up in the air, and so you take that and you put its foot over yours. Both feet. I was amazed at how heavy their feet were when I was doing this. Then you just take your hands and cover its eyes.
So I’m laying there with its feet up and I’m stretched out across this. I can feel its thick, bumpy skin on my belly. So I’m covering its eyes and I’m laying there and I’m like, “I’m doing this. I’m doing this.” Then all of a sudden I feel I kind of lift up a little and then jump forward.
I’m like, “This wasn’t in the protocol.”
Then I look back and, apparently, the protocol only works if your feet are bigger than their feet, and my feet were not bigger than their feet. What it was, it was able to get its toes in a little bit and kind of push itself forward.
I was like, “Okay.” I was like, “Russ?”
He's like, “Yeah?”
He's not that far from me and I was like, “It’s moving.” And we’re making bunny hops all the way to the water and so I’m like, “It’s moving toward the water.”
He looks over at me and he said, “You're going to have to think heavy.”
So I look over at Lou and he's just smiling and prepping his stuff, not moving, and I was like, “Okay. I see how this is. All right. Game on.”
I think to myself, “Okay, towel. Somebody throw me a towel,” so they threw me a towel. I put it over the alligator’s eyes and I rear back and basically reach up on its feet as much as I can. I’m pulling on them as hard as I can and I’m standing there, really sitting there in this awkward position for what felt like forever until the guys come and sample. I was sure the whole time the alligator was just going to turn and I'd get squished but that didn’t happen. It didn’t move and they got their sample.
So back in the truck, and actually many times since then, I've really thought about what it was that made me think that I couldn’t do it and why someone else’s opinions of what I can and can’t do were so much more powerful than my own and, in fact, what could happen when that’s reversed. What if someone doesn’t have faith in your abilities?
So that was really a watershed moment for me in understanding what my limits are. I really think, from that point on, I've been relatively fearless not only in science but in other aspects of my life. Now that I’m a mentor to my own students, my own graduate students, I think my greatest aspiration is really teaching them how to think heavy.