If you have never seen this place in person its worth the trip to Atlanta. I'm down here in Georgia doing some military training but had the weekend off and flew Mrs. Reeferhead in for our 2nd trip to this $300,000,000+ aquarium. This time we forked over the cash and took the behind the scenes tour and were able to see the topsides of several of the exhibits as well as some of the mechanicals and other stuff. We need one of these in STL!
The following are pictures of my two favorite exhibits but the Georgia Aquarium has over 8 million gallons worth. Check out their website http://www.georgiaaquarium.org/ I also took a few short videos I'll post a bit later.
This is the main LIVE reef tank, Pacific Barrier Reef. It has a long way to go as far as coral growth, its only been up for about two years. When we saw it last April it had a bad cyanobacteria outbreak. It has vastly improved, virtually algae free now. Its a full mixed reef; LPS, SPS and Softies, however the SPS are pretty limited. Most of the coral you see (like the Table Acros) are fake silicone, composite, or concrete but they are all encrusted with coraline and providing a base for future live coral. The tank makes up for the current lack of coral with fish, an insane amount and variety of fish. Notice how the acrylic makes a 90 degree vertical curve, this assists the surge device I picture below.
Black Tips in a reef tank, nuts!
They don't utilize the "Fade32 Method" This guy was scraping coraline for over and hour. The acrylic was pristine.
From the Behind the Scene Tour: Topside of the Reef Tank. The right side of the pic is where the curved viewing pane and surge buckets are. The left side of the tank is the back side where they built in a shallower lagoon with mangroves.
Here are the surge buckets. They pour onto the top of the curved viewing pane in sync with the music they play in the viewing room (very cool effect) and the water sweeps over the acrylic and onto the reef. I'll post a video of this when it uploads.
One of three of the massive skimmers running on this tank. Its probably 25 ft high and 10 ft wide. They also run sand filters, sulfur denitrators, and lots of ozone. They can control and monitor all of the tanks and equiptment from one room.
More to come in a sec.... whale sharks
The following are pictures of my two favorite exhibits but the Georgia Aquarium has over 8 million gallons worth. Check out their website http://www.georgiaaquarium.org/ I also took a few short videos I'll post a bit later.
This is the main LIVE reef tank, Pacific Barrier Reef. It has a long way to go as far as coral growth, its only been up for about two years. When we saw it last April it had a bad cyanobacteria outbreak. It has vastly improved, virtually algae free now. Its a full mixed reef; LPS, SPS and Softies, however the SPS are pretty limited. Most of the coral you see (like the Table Acros) are fake silicone, composite, or concrete but they are all encrusted with coraline and providing a base for future live coral. The tank makes up for the current lack of coral with fish, an insane amount and variety of fish. Notice how the acrylic makes a 90 degree vertical curve, this assists the surge device I picture below.
Black Tips in a reef tank, nuts!
They don't utilize the "Fade32 Method" This guy was scraping coraline for over and hour. The acrylic was pristine.
From the Behind the Scene Tour: Topside of the Reef Tank. The right side of the pic is where the curved viewing pane and surge buckets are. The left side of the tank is the back side where they built in a shallower lagoon with mangroves.
Here are the surge buckets. They pour onto the top of the curved viewing pane in sync with the music they play in the viewing room (very cool effect) and the water sweeps over the acrylic and onto the reef. I'll post a video of this when it uploads.
One of three of the massive skimmers running on this tank. Its probably 25 ft high and 10 ft wide. They also run sand filters, sulfur denitrators, and lots of ozone. They can control and monitor all of the tanks and equiptment from one room.
More to come in a sec.... whale sharks
