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Animal scientist finds pearl of a career
It is inhabited by about 1,800 year-round residents who, at any time,
can be found doing one or more of the following:
- Fishing.
- Enjoying the postcard sunrises and sunsets that occur at
the alternate ends of this 14-mile breakwater.
- Swatting at the endless and relentless swarms of no-see-ums
and mosquitoes.
They seem to work in shifts, these insects, 12 on and 12 off, so the
annoyance is constant. But Hamilton has gotten used to the bugs, and
she loves the island. However, she took a circuitous route getting here.
After high school, Hamilton enrolled at the University of Delaware.
She wanted to play major college basketball and get as far away from
home as possible. She succeeded at one and failed at the other.
Hamilton found basketball too intimidating at the level where scholarships
are involved, so she ran track to fuel her competitive fires.
After two years, Hamilton returned home to Indiana and enrolled at
Purdue, admitting, "that's where I should have been in the first
place."
But Hamilton is now a full-fledged islander: She recently bought a
home there.
She works part-time maintaining a Web site, www.aquaNic.org. The site
allows access to all electronic aquaculture information at the national
and international level while striving to increase the amount of electronic
information available to the aquaculture industry.
Hamilton also works for the Mobile National Estuary Program, established
by the Clean Water Act of 1987.
Hamilton is helping clean up the waters of Mobile Bay through a unique
program that turns citizens living on or near the bay into oyster farmers.
In 2001, Hamilton started the program with 30 volunteer oyster farmers
living on or near Dauphin Island.
"We provide each oyster farmer with a Taylor Float (a basket constructed
of wire mesh and PVC tubing) and a supply of very small oysters called
spat," Hamilton says.
The baskets keep the spat suspended in water, keeping them out of the
sediment and protecting them
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