Beyond the desk: A week aboard a USACE dredging vessel to protect an ancient, elusive fish

Saltwater fills the coastal air among the small towns dotting Washington state’s Grays Harbor, located southwest of the Olympic Mountains. The low, steady rumble of motor vessels transiting the harbor is commonplace. For Jacqui Bergner, a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers aquatic biologist, the sound meant work, home, relaxing and more work.

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Bergner is no stranger to fieldwork’s wet, muddy and unpredictable nature. A Chicago native who now calls the Pacific Northwest home, she spent time at Western Washington University conducting nearshore vegetation surveys for her master’s degree in environmental science.

“I’ve done a lot of fieldwork where I’ve needed to be away from home, camping and doing surveys,” she said. “I did a lot of work in eelgrass beds, walking six miles out. So, this work wasn’t necessarily foreign or unfamiliar, but it was a different arena.”