Baited Traps

The baited traps deployed during DISCOL 1-3 were made of plastic tubing of 0.8 m in length and had an inner diameter of about 0.3 m. Each trap consisted of two parts held together by a stainless steel collar with three hooks for easy access to the caught animals. The traps were set at 100, 50, 30, 10, and 5 m above the seafloor with an additional trap mounted directly above the bottom weight. For ballast weight release, two tandem release transponders were arranged in a metal support frame and connected with a chain looped through the ballast weight.

During the course of the DISCOL 1-3 cruises a total of 26 successful deployments were accomplished. At the end of the 27th deployment (see: Cruise report DISCOL 3) the transponder failed and the device could not be recovered from the seafloor.