Matt Wandell has been keeping coral reef aquariums since 1999. He has been a professional aquarist at the Steinhart Aquarium at the California Academy of Sciences and the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Matt has a keen interest in developing new techniques…
7 Questions with Steinhart Aquarium’s Matt Wandell
We thought it would be fun to do a series of “7 Questions” with people in the industry and hobby. Our first candidate is a Matt Wandell, a marine biologist at the Steinhart Aquarium at the California Academy of Sciences…
CAS finding success with hyperbaric chamber to decompress fish
The California Academy of Sciences is finding success in decompressing reef fish from depths around 300 ft. thanks to a unique hyperbaric decompression chamber that provides a safer alternative to piercing the swim bladder. The CAS’s Matt Wandell used a…
These pygmy seahorses officially the cutest things ever
We don’t throw words like ‘cute’ around often here at Reef Builders, but when we do you better believe we mean it. When you look at these images of Bargibant’s pygmy sea horses (Hippocampus bargibanti) you are instantly captivated but when…
A system for automatically feeding fresh and live food to aquarium fish
The concept of this autofeeder was born from the desire to keep food cold, as it was fed out all day to several exhibits without having to set up a full blown refrigerated feeder like the type pioneered by master…
The Golden Hamlet is one of the crown jewels of Caribbean reef fish
As close as we Americans live to the Caribbean Sea, we are woefully under-informed as to the wealth of beautiful corals and reef fish that live there. Case in point is the jaw-dropping gorgeous golden hamlet, Hypoplectrus gumigutta which Japanese and…
MACNA 2013 goes to Miami by the sea for the 25 year anniversary
MACNA 2013 will be hosted next year by the Florida Marine Aquarium Society, essentially the club of the greater Miami, Ft. Lauderdale and south florida reefing sector. Scheduled to take place from August 30th to September 1, 2013, we find…
ReefStock 2011 speakers will be Sharon Ram, Matt Wandell and Julian Sprung
ReefStock is a fun aquarium conference held in Denver Colorado, at the Denver Downtown Aquarium. One month from today, on March 12th, the 4th annual ReefStock will go down once again, featuring some of the best livestock, hottest new products,…
Reef Aquarium Rock Wall Aquascapes can be interesting
Reef Aquarium ‘Rock walls’ have gotten a bad rap over the past , as Adam Blundell recently pointed out. This reputation is not necessarily undeserved as there are plenty of rock walls that are unappealing, flow stopping, detritus collecting piles…
