a Day in Baltimore

[sleeper]

So a few friends and I drove up and spent a whole day at the Baltimore aquarium.

What an amazing experience!! This truly is the finest aquarium I've ever seen, and any hobbyist would appreciate it that much more. From the very beginning you're shown various rays and small sharks in what must be a 2,000-5,000 gallon tank (at such large sizes my ability to guestimate is severely reduced). From there you get every manner of fish, fowl, turtle, snake, or frog in, under or around the waters of the various exhibits they feature.

At the moment, they're doing Maryland (duh), which has an interesting array of amphibians I didn't even know about, like massive bullfrogs. I also learned quite a bit about our eroding Chesapeake Bay tidal lands, due to overdevelopment and pollution, and they give viewers information on how to get involved if they so choose, which is so much better than just kvetching about it.

By far my favorite was the indonesian reef display, with various anenome fish (clown, pink, etc), tangs, blennies, boxfish (like the longhorn cowfish -- AWESOME!!), and my personal favorite of all fish, one I may one day put in a reef tank, the mandarin dragonet. WHat beautiful animals. I also saw the dark side of our hobby, as the aquarium explained that overcollection of seahorses has greatly reduced their numbers in the wild -- but in Baltimore they breed six different varieties to try and stem that problem.

The dolphin show was corny, of course, but it was still spectacular to see how well trained they are.

Boy, I just thought I'd share the joy. If anyone is curious about what they had I'd be happy to share.

[t_chelle16]

Sounds like fun!

When I was trying to find a home for my red oscar, I called all the local aquariums & zoos and found out that they only keep native fish. I was upset not only because I would have loved for my oscar to go to an aquarium (so I knew he'd be well taken care of), but also because I was looking forward to visiting a few of those places and wanted to see some nice exotic tropicals as well (not that natives are bad, I was just hoping for a wider variety). But the next time I'm in Springfield (maybe around April), I'm going to be sure to take my camera and visit Bass Pro. Last time I was there, they had a several thousand gallon tank with about 5 huge large mouth bass along with several indoor streams and ponds. And that was just in the store.

-Chelle

[sleeper]

Do you ever stop and think about whether the fish get depressed being in confinement? Like, Nurse sharks? Or (in may case), mollies and gouramis and plecos?

Even 100 gallon tanks, which are muy nice and roomy by hobbyist standards... are the tiniest fraction of what the fish could be experiencing in nature...

[gravity]

They also have food delivered to them, and assuming proper care, are safe from predators at all times, which probably means they live longer in captivity than they do in the wild. Also, I'm sure they hardly know what they're missing.

Finding Nemo isn't a true story.

[kc5gvn]

Hi sleeper, I wouldn't be overly concerned about the "dark side" of our hobby. When levels get too low on any fish they go on the IUCN list as endangered and cannot be harvested. I believe the site fishbase.org has a link where you can view the list of endangered fish. On the brighter side, if you have any fish in your tank that were caught in nature and not farm raised there is a good chance that you have saved his life due to the laws of natural selection (survival of the fitist).

[sleeper]

Wait wait wait wait... Finding Nemo didn't happen? Nice try. Those guys at Disney ALWAYS tell the truth.

Ha! Imagine someone thinking Finding Nemo didn't happen... what's next? The U.S. reelecting George Bush? Pleeeease!

[kc5gvn]

Sorry sleeper, "Finding Nemo" was a movie which means it doesn't have to be true. Now, if you saw it on TV then it has to be true. HAHA