A little over a year ago, on my first trip to San Francisco, I stumbled into a temporary aquarium space for the California Academy of Sciences. They had an enormous, two-story coral reef setup, along with an aquaculture facility for propagating more corals. Talking with the staff informed me that the tank was a test to see if coral could be grown in captivity at extreme depths, and the propagation facility was for growing out colonies to populate a much larger tank that would be located in their permanent building, scheduled to open late in 2008.
Being out there for business this week, I took advantage of a few spare hours to get over and check out the finished tank. Unfortunately there wasn't much stocked in the form of corals yet. I'm not sure if they are adding species in slowly or what. There was an enormously large and diverse population of fish however, along with some other innovations. A large sand bed with a full grown mangrove tree was attached to the aquarium. A walled off section for sharks and rays, as well as a shallow lagoon area was also attached to the tank. The reef tank is impressive in size and ambition, but as all reef keepers know, it will take several years to reach it's true potential.
The california coast tank was also quite large, and featured an enormous wave box. From what was visible, it appeared to work on the same principal as the systems common to home aquarium. But check out the size of these waves:
My favorite section of the aquarium was the staff picks. Here small aquariums and terrariums were set into a wall, featuring a favorite species or biotope of each staff member. There was an incredible reef tank here, with a coral wall built along the left hand side leaving dramatic open space through most of the tank. Very cool.
Below are some photos I snapped, and there are a few more to be found on my Flickr account.
My favorite tank design:
Primary viewing window for the reef (there are several others):
Some of the reef lighting. There was another tier of lights above this, as well as natural sun lighting through the roof:
Feeding time on the reef:
The California coast:
Resident of the cold water tank:
Labels: Coral, Coral Reef, Design, Equipment, Fish, Link, Photos
