Monterey Bay Aquarium

The Monterey Bay Aquarium is an aquarium in Monterey, California, United States.
==History==
Marine biologists Steve Webster, Nancy Burnett, and two other colleagues, had the idea for the Aquarium in 1977.
Nancy Burnett was the daughter of , who funded the aquarium. Nancy's sister, Julie Packard, became the aquarium's director. and is now an independently operated nonprofit organization, funded by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Foundation.
The aquarium opened in October 1984. The building was designed to resemble the , which once occupied the same site.
By August 1985, it had received almost two million visitors. In 1994, it had attracted 17.5 million visitors. There were just over 2,000,000 visitors in 2014.
In June 2011, the aquarium underwent a $19M renovation.
In 2016, the aquarium announced plans for a $30 million education building, designed to house an existing educational department.
In March 2017, the aquarium supported the . Their penguins had their own miniature Science March.
==Exhibits and conservation==
When the aquarium first opened, most life-support systems and filtration for tanks were handled manually. This system was vulnerable to human error, and required staff to be on-site 24 hours a day to ensure all aquarium processes ran smoothly. By 2000, the control system provided automation, monitoring, and alarming for the life support system, and controlled repetitive tasks.
When the aquarium opened, it had the first tank to contain a living kelp forest.
In August 1986, the aquarium obtained the first to be exhibited in the United States.
The aquarium sits on a bay where twenty-seven species of marine mammals live or pass through. On some days, whales and dolphins can be seen from the aquarium's deck, and thus it has never considered keeping them in captivity.
The aquarium has a penguin colony, which hatched five chicks between 2011 and 2014.
===Open Sea===
In July 2011, the aquarium opened The Open Sea exhibit, which simulates the migration of ocean animals across the Pacific Ocean. Six great white sharks were brought to the aquarium between 2004 and 2011. Five were released after six months or less. The sixth was added to the Open Sea tank.
===Into the Deep===
In April 2022, the aquarium opened Into the Deep: Exploring our Undiscovered Ocean, the world’s first large-scale deep-sea exhibit. It cost $15 million.
As guests walk through the exhibition, they are move further into the water column, first passing a lower section of the Aquarium’s Open Sea tank, signifying the ocean’s “sunlit zone,” before lower-lying animals are introduced. Midwater creatures are followed by life found from the seafloor. Some species included in the show are imported from Japan.
===Otters===
Since 1984, the aquarium has had a Sea Otter Research and Conservation program, which studies and rescues sea otters. They have an Intensive Care Unit and enclosures filled with seawater, which can hold ten animals at one time. Once returned to the wild, the otters are monitored with radio transmitters. A 2013 Nature documentary focuses on a baby otter at the Monterey Bay Aquarium.
Otters that cannot be released to the wild are named, usually after characters from the works of .
===Seafood Watch===
The Monterey Bay Aquarium operates a Seafood Watch program and consumer guide. The consumer guide identifies sustainable seafood options as being “well managed and caught or farmed in ways that cause little harm to habitats or other wildlife.” Unsustainable seafood practices can lead to overfishing, bycatch and habitat damage by fishing equipment. Fisheries scientists examine commonly bought fish and shellfish, and analyse the health of the species population, how the fishery affects other species, how well it is managed, and how the fishery affects the habitat and ecosystem of the area in which it operates. Each fish is rated either Best Choice, Good Alternative or Avoid.
===Other===
In August 2013, aquarium biologists released threatened .
The aquarium offered remarks at the 2017 , which focused on environmental issues.
==Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute==
In 1987, David Packard founded The Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI), which has six stated goals:
*Identify important areas of marine science where research progress is limited by lack of appropriate technology.
*Develop sophisticated systems for investigating aspects of the marine environment and its inhabitants where high scientific potential exists.
*Meet the highest possible performance standards for the operation of its equipment and technological systems.
*Conduct high-quality, innovative research that maximizes effective management and use of all MBARI assets.
*Develop, in collaboration with the Monterey Bay Aquarium, creative programs that maximize the educational value of MBARI’s research results.
*Transfer research results, technology, and operational techniques to the marine science community worldwide.
It is located in Moss Landing, California, where its three research ships and two remotely operated vehicles are berthed, giving them access to Monterey Bay. MBARI operates several autonomous underwater vehicles and maintains moorings offshore, equipped with ocean-monitoring instruments.
In 2021, construction of a new research vessel, the R/V David Packard, began.
==Awards==
In 2000, the aquarium received a in the People's Voice category.
In 2003, the aquarium's Seafood Watch Online programme won a Muse award from the . In September 2008, the programme was named 's Tastemaker of the Year.
In October 2011, the aquarium won the Twenty-Five Year Award, which recognizes buildings between twenty-five and fifty years old which still serve their original purpose.
In September 2017, the aquarium received the ' Conservation Award.
===Association of Zoos and Aquariums===
In 1992, The Monterey Bay Aquarium won an Edward H. Bean Award, which recognises captive breeding programmes, from the for a breeding program for . In 1999, it won another for its programme.
In 1992, the Aquarium won an Education Award for Live from Monterey Canyon In 2002, it won one for its Splash Zone Education Programs.
In 2003, the Aquarium won a Significant Achievement Award for Jellies: Living Art.
In 2007, they won an Angela Peterson Excellence in Diversity Award Significant Achievement for Young Women in Science. In 2013, it won for Watsonville Area Teens Conserving Habitats (WATCH).
In 2013, the aquarium won a North American Conservation Significant Achievement Award for their Sea Otter Research and Conservation Program.
==YouTube==
When the aquarium closed in 2020 due to COVID-19, ten live webcams remained streaming. They featured the sea otter tank, kelp forest tank, aviary, penguins, open sea tank, jellyfish tanks and live views of Monterey Bay.
It has made a number of videos in collaboration with SciShow.
==Trivia==
*The aquarium inspired the one in the 2016 film .
*A scene from was filmed at the aquarium.
==Subscriber milestones==
*100,000 subscribers: August 3, 2020
==References==
Category:Educational YouTubers
Category:American YouTubers
Category:Users who joined in 2006