Bringing Public Aquariums Home: Have you been inspired by something that you have seen in a public aquarium?

[Jay Hemdal]

Going to the Long Beach Aquarium/Aquarium of the Pacific "Adult Night" tonight. We went for my B-day last month on a Saturday during the day. OMG the screaming kids in an echo chamber! If you are a parent, you must have some skills to tune it out. Also when one starts, they all go off. LOL... So tonight will be nice.
Am I inspired? Yes! My surge tide pool tank was inspired by Cabrillo Aquarium. Am I sometimes disappointed and think some things should be done differently? Yes! But as @Jay Hemdal pointed out it has a lot to do with time and money and other limited resources. I also think as home aquarists we can be on the cutting edge of new developments or fine tuning old developments, because out systems are smaller (usually). It is hard to get funding for projects on what is "trending" in the industry and upscaling it to a large scale.
I will say this. Most aquariums are designed around the general public and not around aquarists. Most of the time I leave with more questions than inspiration.
For example; at LBA there is a sign that says most of their corals are confiscated from illegal coral traffickers/sellers. But if you look at their corals it is just normal corals that you can get anywhere. So it is confusing, because if the general public would see our tanks they would assume we have illegal corals. Another thing at LBA in there Babies display they have a bunch of (I assume) tank bred blue tangs, about an inch long. What happens in a month when they are not babies anymore?

When you say "illegal corals" you are likely thinking of high end, rare corals that were smuggled in. The vast majority of confiscated corals are just regular shipments that were brought in without proper CITES documentation. Or, one or two rare corals get hidden in the boxes and the whole shipment gets confiscated. Since they are near LAX, they get asked to house these confiscations quite often. Back in the 1980's, USFWS used to just dry confiscated corals out and use them as evidence. I've accepted confiscated corals from DTW - it is a LOT of work and heartbreak. First of all, the confiscation process adds time to corals that have already been boxed for 36+ hours. Lots of them die. You also have to house EVERYTHING that came in the shipment - I once had to take in 100 pieces of gracillaria algae because it was growing on illegal coral rock. Then, you need to track everything for USFWS through a chain of custody, usually for 90 days. I just heard that 30+ boxes were confiscated at MIA last week and were sent to public aquariums.

Jay

 

[vlangel]

Cant say i get inspired but rather enjoy the scenery
Speaking of Public aquariums, John Shedd aquarium in Chicago had a LONG time Beluga whale at their aquarium. It died yesterday
Her name was Mauyak - Age 41

I am more in this camp too. I very much enjoy seeing public aquariums where they can house a multitude of different animals in different tanks. That is fun however I am committed to just 1 tank and doing it well. That carries with it the limitations of only keeping compatible creatures but I am ok with that.

Sorry to hear about Mauyak but it no doubt lived longer there than it would have in the wild.

 

[wheels 45]

I have been to Ripley's aquarium in Toronto 3 times and the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago twice. The different aquariums give me ideas for fish or aquascaping

 

[MnFish1]

Have you been inspired by something that you have seen in a public aquarium, at an amusement park, or in a super-sized commercial setting? While it may not be practical to have a massive reef in your home, there is still a lot that we can learn from public aquariums. As you watch video tours, visit the displays, or take behind-the-scenes tours, what have you learned that you can apply to your personal tank?

If you’re not sure where to start looking for inspiration from public aquariums, we have sponsors like Orphek, Tenecor, and others that provide equipment and consulting for public aquariums.

Check out these articles from @Orphek about their experiences with public aquariums:

https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/orphe...g-lasting-love-affair-part-i-middle-east.877/

https://www.reef2reef.com/ams/amazonas-500-led-lighting-is-over-the-tanks-of-nausicaá-the-biggest-aquarium-in-europe.850/

@Tenecor Aquariums has many articles available here on R2R that share a massive amount of information on acrylic and other topics in their "A Tenecor® Explainer" series:
https://www.reef2reef.com/search/3742200/?q=A+Tenecor%C2%AE+Explainer&c[users]=Tenecor+Aquariums&o=relevance

In the discussion below, please share your inspiration and any ideas that you learned from a public aquarium and have implemented in your own tank!

Yes - the pond type tanks that have a waterfall type of flow (i.e. there is a water fall flowing into the tank - which starts and stop - much like waves in on the shore. It shows how much flow that corals, etc can take - and it's far far more than we see in our tanks. (just like the flow in the ocean is often much much higher on the reef than in our tanks.

 

[whybenormal]

The ideas I keep trying to bring home keep getting shot down by my wife. She doesn't want me to have an aquarium tunnel or arch in the house and she won't let me have a Ray petting tank... I do see some neat aquascaping and all that but I always tend to end up with more of a pile of rocks in my tank. Recently I decided to try some of the DIY Aragocrete Reef Rocks and I've actually been able to do a little more with my rock work.

Sorry it's a little dirty.

I can sympathize with this. My husband won't let me get a pet ray either, or ray petting tank. or tunnels/arch.

 

[Cthulukelele]

My last public aquarium visit is actually what prompted me to put together a heavily planted desk freshwater tank. There's a serenity to that sort of tank we rarely see in our reefs.

 

[whybenormal]

When I visited Monterey Bay Aquarium I fell in love with jellies, and didn't rest until I had a jellyfish tank. Kept my moon jellies alive for almost a year.

 

[vlangel]

When I read that a lot of the public aquariums use Instant Ocean as their artificial salt water that gave me confidence that I can trust IO.

 

[Eienna]

My dream fish, the Bartlett's Anthias, is one I saw at a public aquarium