And We're Off... To a Great Start!

We've been busy, busy, busy and extremely excited about the new season which started March 6th. We are now open daily from 11am-5pm. Our opening day coincided with the opening day celebrations of the Pacific Rim Whale Festival. We have been getting the aquarium ready for another year of fun: Painting, plumbing, cleaning and labeling are all part of our preparations. What we needed next were critters! Some of our collection techniques include well orchestrated beach seines and the tried, tested and true method of bicycle-wheel-net fishing off of the dock. Materials used are high tech garbage pails, good ole scoop nets, and last but definitely not least our friendly local divers Sporty, Marcel and free diver, Darryl...you have all done tremendous jobs and we Thank You!

This last month, we took a short break from collecting and headed out into the communities. We were invited to attend marine career fairs in Ahousaht and at the Ucluelet Secondary School. It was great to see the excitement on everyone’s face as they got to check out our tank of sea creatures and ask questions about what it's like to work at the Ucluelet Aquarium.

For the past two weeks, we’ve been setting up friendly and suitable new homes for the temporary inhabitants at the aquarium to enjoy as they serve as the ambassadors of their species, teaching the public about lifestyles that protect the environment and ways to help conserve our oceans, locally and internationally. A big challenge for the JCP crew is learning husbandry techniques, which is a very important part of aquarium species placement. If done incorrectly, one creature in the tank could eat the other (oh my!). Just because they are in an aquarium doesn’t mean that nature still wont take its course!

Individual or family season’s passes are available so you can keep coming back for more education and fun anytime.

Thanks to all for your support and love. We can't wait to see you on the promenade this year.