Friday Smorgasbord: Underwater art, resort get scrapped, library won’t get ‘Tanked,’ staycations, and finding NEEMO

It’s Friday and we have a slew of fun, interesting and unusual posts for our Friday Smorgasbord. In this week’s edition we have underwater art, a library that won’t be getting ‘Tanked,’ an interesting take on staycations and we’ll be…

Watch Luiz Rocha’s presentation on the Diversity and Evolution of Coral Reef Fishes

If you weren’t able to make it to last week’s Diversity and Evolution of Coral Reef Fishes, fret not because this informative talk is already up and live on the interwebz. Dr. Luiz Rocha, the ichthyologist who has described for…

Rising Tide – Ternate Damselfish lastest addition to “been there, done that” breeding list!

The team at the University of Florida Tropical Aquaculture Lab continue to hit home runs, breaking new ground on every frontier.  Their latest success, rearing Ternate Damselfish (Amblyglyphidodon ternatensis) hatched from eggs shipped from the Steinhart Aquarium in San Fancisco,…

Tunze Masterstream – seen almost in the wild

Several months ago we [the Steinhart Aquarium] received a Tunze Master Stream to try out and to add water flow to one of our 4000 gallon exhibits. When it arrived we excitedly pulled it out of the box only to…

California Academy of Sciences NightLife highlights sustainable seafood

The California Academy of Sciences, located in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park and home to the world famous Steinhart Aquarium, hosts a unique event every Thursday night. The NightLife series is an over 21 event, opening the doors for a…

Daylight soft coral spawn caught on film in the Phillipines

[vimeo width=”680″ height=”385″]http://vimeo.com/24080492[/vimeo] We’ve been lucky to follow along on the adventures of the California Academy of Sciences team that is currently on biodiversity expedition of the Philippines and have seen various postings from Richard Ross and Matt Wandell of…

Patterns of schooling fish in the 200,000 gallon Phillipine Reef of the Steinhart Aquarium

[youtube width=”670″ height=”400″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZSINQ0N0l0[/youtube] There’s truly no better way to start the week than by transporting yourself to an imaginary place by watching an awesome reef video. Last week we had the Cozumel Dive video on an actual Caribbean reef and…

Flamboyant Cuttlefish, Metasepia pfefferi, mating on Video

[youtube width=”640″ height=”385″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjLapY8mPI4[/youtube] Metasepia pfefferi is an amazing species of flamboyant cuttlefish and I have recently had the opportunity to obtain multiple specimens of this species for the first time in 8 years. These flamboyant cuttlefish wasted little time getting on…

First documented spawning of Ribbon Eels at the Steinhart Aquarium

Ribbon Eels are fascinating animals for public display but reports of the successful acclimation of these timid and finicky eels are rather uncommon.  There are many ideas about why these fish tend to fare poorly in captivity, including latent effects…

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…