Happy New Year to everyone, hope you all had a great Christmas holiday and celebrated the new year in suitably! Here at the Oceanarium, after having a brief time to relax with family over the Christmas period, our Aquarists had to jump right back in to a very busy January!
Every January here at the Oceanarium, and across every zoo and aquarium in the UK, we have to conduct a comprehensive stock take, which involves accounting for every single one of our approximately 1,500 creatures.
‘Tis the season to eat and be merry… so do you plan to over-indulge with mince pies, roast dinners and chocolate this Christmas or will you be counting every calorie that goes past those lips?
Already consuming one fifth of their own body weight each day, that’s no concern for our two otter residents, Stan and Roxy, who as a reward for their training progress and good behaviour this year, have received some extra yummy treats.
During a special Annual Pass event hosted at the weekend, members of the Oceanarium Kids’ Club helped prepare Stan and Roxy a delicious Christmas feast. The festive menu consisted of hermit crab shells stuffed with mince meat, grated carrots, peas, juicy cranberries and everyone’s favourite, brussel sprouts! Once the children finished decorating their food shells, the treats were hidden within a Christmas present for the otters to open, scoop out and eat with their little dexterous paws.
The Oceanarium is celebrating after we were announced as the winner of the 2011 Tourism Attraction of the Year award at last week’s prestigious Bournemouth Tourism Awards 2011 hosted on Thursday 1st December at the BIC.
We are absolutely thrilled to have won as we were up against some very strong competition. It is fantastic to have the investment we make into the attraction recognised by the local industry and affirm our position as Bournemouth’s leading visitor attraction.
As you probably know by now, Otter Oasis is home to Oriental small clawed otters, but what you may not know is that coinciding with the recent completion of the balcony extension (the final stage of the £150k enclosure development), we have actually had two adorable new otters arrive at the Oceanarium!
It has been very exciting as the Keepers here at the Oceanarium have always had a long-term vision of establishing a breeding programme for our otters.
The decision was made to try and pair a couple of otters up to see how they got along. So last week, a young male from our sister attraction, Lakes Aquarium, and a young female from Blackpool Zoo, were both moved down to Bournemouth and introduced to their new home and each other. Bea, our last otter resident was, in turn, transferred to Lakes Aquarium to join another.
With summer drawing to a close and the colder weather creeping in unfortunately, we are lucky enough that high temperatures still remain in the Oceanarium’s Turtle Beach exhibit.
Pride of place within Turtle Beach is our Reptile Sanctuary showcasing a group of Spiny-tailed lizards, accompanied by a young Spiny-tail named after British tennis star Andy Murray.
Andy was born right here in the Oceanarium during Wimbledon in 2009, leading appropriately to his naming by our aquarium staff.
At around two and a half years old, Andy is still a little way yet from becoming mature. However, in recent weeks we have moved Andy from a separate tank to the main Spiny-tailed lizard exhibit to integrate him with his Spiny-tailed friends as he progresses towards adulthood.
A big thank you to the volunteers who gave up their Sunday morning, to help us clean 2 bags of rubbish from Hengistbury Head as part of the Marine Conservation Society’s (MCS) Beachwatch project.
Led by our Oceanarium Aquarist, Gary Hicks, the four volunteers collected and recorded the rubbish along a 100 metre stretch of beach. The data will help MCS identify the main sources of litter on Hengistbury Head and keep the issue of the dangers of marine litter high on the local agenda.
The beach litter survey recorded a total of 537 items, with the top five items found on the day identified as food wrappers, string, polystyrene, small bits of plastic, and plastic caps/lids.
Beach litter isn’t just unsightly, it can also be very dangerous to both humans and wildlife. MCS is working towards ensuring local communities right up to UK governments work together to try and stop littering at source. On Hengistbury Head, the main type of litter we found was fishing litter, like fishing line and nets. These are potentially lethal to marine wildlife as they can cause entanglement. Awareness of the issue needs to be raised in the local fishing community, and providing waste reception facilities at ports can offer a sensible alternative, but incentives may need to be introduced before this method is effective.
Plus you can always help, just remember when you are visiting any of our beautiful beaches please remember to take any litter away with you and dispose of it in an appropriate bin or in a suitable manner. Every little bit will help make a difference!
Oliver Buttling, Oceanarium Curator
The Oceanarium & MCS need your help again…. Join us for the UKs biggest beach clean and survey!
MCSs annual Beachwatch campaign to reduce litter on our beaches and at sea is back again…
The MCS Beachwatch Big Weekend litter survey and clean-up is a national event that has taken place on the third weekend of September (to coincide with the International Coastal Clean, ICC) every year since 1993.
Thousands of volunteers from around the UK spend just a few hours of the MCS Beachwatch Big Weekend helping to clean up and survey our coastline.
In the last month we have hosted three ‘Aquarist for a Day’ experiences; we have had mother and daughter duo, Tina and 13 year old Alix, join us for a day, then Sue and 14 year old Chris and finally Alan and his 12 year old daughter Chloe last week.
The ‘Aquarist for a Day’ packages allow visitors to enter the world of us Aquarists, and to spend a day discovering the in-and-outs of our everyday job with access behind the Oceanarium scenes.
The experience is hands-on straight away. A popular part of the package is getting to help feed lots of our creatures and the chance to get closer to them than a normal visitor. Continue reading
We have been incredibly busy here at the Oceanarium the last couple of weeks! Summer time is always busy for us but in particular the weeks running up to the summer holidays with lots of school groups visiting us as an end of term outing, and everything to prepare for when the schools break up for the summer holidays!
As part of the school visits, groups are entitled to free guided tours by our knowledgeable Welcome Hosts, giving kids an opportunity to find out a whole lot more about all our characters at the Oceanarium and to ask as many questions they want along the way! The Welcome Hosts love getting to engage with children and teachers alike, and to drum up enthusiasm in a subject that they are very passionate about!!
Therefore, they are always massively appreciative and so pleased when they receive thank you notes and letters from schools that have really enjoyed their visit and have taken something away from their time with us. We have received so many in the last month that we thought it would be a waste to not display them for all to see the effort that the school children have put into making the cards and notes. So if you’re visiting, take a look at our notice board near the exit to the Oceanarium and take a few minutes to read the lovely things the children have to say, and admire their great drawings and photos!
Here at the Oceanarium we have been experimenting with QR codes, as a little something new to offer our visitors during their visit.
For those that may not have yet heard of QR (Quick Response) codes, here is a brief explanation:
WHAT ARE QR CODES
They are a pixellated black and white square code that look this this….
This little square code when scanned by a smartphone(one that is internet enabled) can lead you to a whole host of additional information about the subject where you found the code.
You can find a more detailed explanation from Wikipedia here
