The complexity and interdependence, richness and diver- sity, of the reef have meaning for human lives that is intellectual, spiritual, and aesthetic. This richness is available in the large tropical reef aquarium in a way that it is not with a zoo. In the zoo there are no systemic connections. The animals are fed at publicized feeding times, and we take pleasure in observing the relationship between the keeper and the kept but not between the kept and the natural system. In the aquarium, apart from the artificial separation of predator from prey, it is still possible to see interspecies relationships in action.
Herbivorous fishes find their own food in algae growing on fiber- glass walls.
In addition, the fishes have learned an extra thing or two about their unusual environment. They know there's a talk show on at 10 in the morning and that a Liver will appear with a squeeze bottle of marine fish flakes. They cluster around the plastic bottle in a fish cloud of color that brings sleep pleasure to the viewer on the other side of the tank wall.