SEA LIFE London Aquarium SEA LIFE London Aquarium’s new penguin experience

Zambar said:
Sea Life and the Seal Sanctuaries, along with New Forest Nature Quest, were originally owned by another attractions company called Vardon Plc I believe, which sold most of their attractions to Merlin at the end of the nineties. So I think there's always been the profit-based catalyst at the back.
Click to expand...

The Sealife Centres started at Oban in Scotland by David Mace who had some involvement with a fish-farming company called Golden Sea Produce. Yes, Vardon owned Sealife and was formed by a company by-out that then formed Merlin Entertainments.

More details about the Merlin HERE:

[ame=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merlin_Entertainments]Merlin Entertainments - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame]


The video linked elsewhere of the new exhibit looks interesting. I will try and visit it in the next week or so.


--
 
John Dineley said:
My contacts tell that is correct. I believe it was some form of compacting in the gut due to swallowing foreign object(s). They also lost a seal as well apparently.
Click to expand...

I think that's one point in favour of keeping gentoos indoors, as in theory at least, there should be less opportunity of them swallowing foreign objects.
 
Penguins in the basement are nothing new - everybody saw it years ago in Batman. I hope at least the restaurant will allow us to experience cooked penguin eggs.

;)

(That is to comment on all London collections total inability to show something remarkable and making fuss over mundane animals and exhibits which can be seen in 5 or 15 zoos in smaller towns in Britain).
 
Jurek7 said:
Penguins in the basement are nothing new - everybody saw it years ago in Batman. I hope at least the restaurant will allow us to experience cooked penguin eggs.

;)

(That is to comment on all London collections total inability to show something remarkable and making fuss over mundane animals and exhibits which can be seen in 5 or 15 zoos in smaller towns in Britain).
Click to expand...

Can't comment on the exhibit as I haven't seen it but I don't think there's anything mundane about gentoo penguins. And there aren't that many in the UK. They are generally much more active and when breeding have at least got open nests so all that behaviour is visible too (if the nesting area is). All penguins are not alike and I know from my local zoo that they are a huge draw if done properly and quite rightly so.
 
John Dineley said:
The Sealife Centres started at Oban in Scotland by David Mace who had some involvement with a fish-farming company called Golden Sea Produce.
Click to expand...

I have just dug out a 1990 Sea Life Centre Guide Book which is interesting. The first Sea Life was at Oban and opened in 1979. By 1990 the group Sea Life Centres (Holdings) Ltd owned:

Oban
Weymouth
Portsmouth *
St Andrews #
Hastings *
Blackpool
Scarborough
Brighton
Rhyl *
​

Some of which are now owned by other aquarium operators.

* Blue Reef Aquariums
+ The SeaQuariums Group
# St Andrews Aquarium

It is also interesting to note that the guide book reflects the original ethos of the aquariums as being primarily displays of marine wildlife from the UK's coastlines and seas.
 
Yes, it absolutely was the aim to showcase local marine life. Often press releases when new aquaria opened made much of the fact the majority of the exhibits were found in the wild within three miles of the coast where the aquarium was situated.

One of the first to break away from this trend was Weymouth, initially with the Seahorse breeding program, which started with the ramulosus seahorses and soon extended to the Australian 'big bellies', as these were larger and therefore the fry were easier to feed. Around 1996 some of the larger sites began having themed non-native exhibitions, I think Blackpool and Great Yarmouth, also Birmingham, and some of these had large sharks, including Sand Tigers at Blackpool.

Some time after 1998/99, Vardon appeared to sell off the Sea Life chain, some remained Sea Life Centres (eg. Blackpool), whereas others became 'Sea Life Aquariums' (eg Hastings). Several years later, many of the smaller sites that had been re-named as aquariums were absorbed, as your post above states, into other companies (eg Blue reef).

The smallest sites did not really diversify into non-native species until they were taken over by other companies. Now, at those sites, I'd say that non-natives are more the norm, with a few exhibits for native species very much a sideshow.

The corporate feel to these collections, the aggressive local marketing, and the relentless reinvention of exhibits within relatively spaces would no doubt have exhausted the pull of local sea life being exhibited year on year. In my opinion it was inevitable that otters, penguins, reptiles, and tropical species would gradually be added as the need to launch a new 'zone' year on year continued.

Often the history of individual collections is discussed on this site with fondness and nostalgia. I for one am pleased that the monopoly on UK aquaria has ended somewhat, and that there are a number of companies and organisations running a range (in terms of welfare and quality) of sites that allow the public to choose.
 
Why did they sell off Portsmouth and other locations to Blue Reef? Were they making a loss? I remember visiting the Portsmouth one when it was a Sealife one, they still have the ray bay there.
 
johnstoni said:
Often the history of individual collections is discussed on this site with fondness and nostalgia. I for one am pleased that the monopoly on UK aquaria has ended somewhat, and that there are a number of companies and organisations running a range (in terms of welfare and quality) of sites that allow the public to choose.
Click to expand...

Indeed. And I do miss the original ethos of the Sea Life Centres as the UK coastline holds a wonderful collection of species that if innovatively displayed can rival tropical shark tunnels etc.

As a visitor attraction Sea Life are fine but because of the corporate management style they can be much of a muchness. One has to speculate (as I have done privately with some zoo staff) how much mileage is left with this format and it is not just a matter of time where their holding company will be doing another consolidation exercise and removing 'loss making' venues?

It's an open joke in the zoo world that Sea Life is referred to the MacDonald's of the aquarium industry because this is exactly what they have done in the formulation of their business plan. The classic template being half the footprint of the venue exhibit area, quarter shop and restaurant. Not that they are now a lone in this at Living Coasts have a huge shop - as always prior to the exit ;)

Although one can't be too critical as of course zoological collections have to make money to survive. Although in the case of Sea Life this is basically to line the pockets of venture capitalist who generally seek a short term return for their investment of probably no more than five to ten years max.

--
 
JamesB said:
Why did they sell off Portsmouth and other locations to Blue Reef? Were they making a loss? I remember visiting the Portsmouth one when it was a Sealife one, they still have the ray bay there.
Click to expand...

They probably didn't make enough profit. Bear in mind James these companies are run by accountants not charities or not-for-profit animal collections such as ZSL or even one of my old employers The Welsh Mountain Zoo which was a family business but is now run as a charity by The National Zoological Society of Wales.

While a number of zoos in the UK are charity based it would be interesting to see which aquaria are. The National Aquarium comes to mind and ZSL's aquarium in London Zoo but most aquaria in the UK are not public aquariums in the true sense but commercial enterprises.

--
 
John Dineley said:
Indeed. And I do miss the original ethos of the Sea Life Centres as the UK coastline holds a wonderful collection of species that if innovatively displayed can rival tropical shark tunnels etc.

As a visitor attraction Sea Life are fine but because of the corporate management style they can be much of a muchness. One has to speculate (as I have done privately with some zoo staff) how much mileage is left with this format and it is not just a matter of time where their holding company will be doing another consolidation exercise and removing 'loss making' venues?

It's an open joke in the zoo world that Sea Life is referred to the MacDonald's of the aquarium industry because this is exactly what they have done in the formulation of their business plan. The classic template being half the footprint of the venue exhibit area, quarter shop and restaurant. Not that they are now a lone in this at Living Coasts have a huge shop - as always prior to the exit ;)

Although one can't be too critical as of course zoological collections have to make money to survive. Although in the case of Sea Life this is basically to line the pockets of venture capitalist who generally seek a short term return for their investment of probably no more than five to ten years max.

--
Click to expand...

Yes, the original ethos had some magic to it, but I think the locally-sourced stock had often been through a lot of trauma being hauled in amongst commercial catch, plus the public didn't really see dogfish, nursehounds, smooth hounds etc as real sharks, the leaflets always depicted the classic shark shape swimming above a perspex tunnel, and so Tope were often acquired but, as an open-water species, did not appear to fare as well in many exhibits and injuries to the nose were not unusual. I only ever saw mature tope in Weymoth, in an open indoor lake, with smooth, sloping sides.

On opening a link on another thread to an article about Chester, I saw one of the related articles linked was this one about the Sea Life group:

Merlin Entertainments: Rocking around the World

It corrects my earlier post where I suggested that the 'Sea Life Aquaria' had been sold off before being renamed; it would appear this was the other way round. Apologies if this has been specifically posted/discussed before.
 
johnstoni said:
It corrects my earlier post where I suggested that the 'Sea Life Aquaria' had been sold off before being renamed; it would appear this was the other way round. Apologies if this has been specifically posted/discussed before.
Click to expand...

And also remember that Sea Life acquired a couple of aquariums and re-branded them as Sea Life.

Brighton Aquarium being one and of coures recently London Aquarium. But they also acquired Great Yarmouth and Hunstanton which were built by Joe Larter and a property company called RKF who also owned Pleasurewood Hills theme park which Later cretaed in the 1980's.

Larter also had some dealing with the aquarium on the pier at Clacton for a period of time which I guess finished when RKF went bankrupt in the 1990's.

There was talk of him using Clacton as a half-way house to stock his other aquariums which suggests he had bigger plans than just the venues built at Great Yarmouth and Hunstanton. He was already in the process of building a second Pleasure Wood Hills at Cleethropes on the site of the old zoo - which is now Pleasure Island owned by Flamingoland which ironically was as a zoo owned by Flamingoland - but that was also scuppered by the failure of RKF.

--
 
johnstoni said:
On opening a link on another thread to an article about Chester, I saw one of the related articles linked was this one about the Sea Life group:

Merlin Entertainments: Rocking around the World
Click to expand...

I very interesting article and quite candid. Having worked for Tussuads group the corporate feel seems still to be there which is why I think I will never work for people like that again - mind you, never say never ;)

One comment struck me, however:

In the SLCs, (Sea Life Centres) the ocean tank is the “big ride”. Because we come from a more entertainment/show based background, we dress the tank and theme it, basically taking the theme park principal and transferring it to aquariums. So you might see bigger fish elsewhere but we’d have a plane crashed in the middle of the tank. Ours would be magical.​

Which perhaps is actually the problem as the animals appear to play second against themeing although that isn't to suggest that their welfare isn't catered for appropriately.

And I get the impression this is much the same when it comes to issues of genuine involvement in conservation and research. Merlin operate theme parks first and foremost and whilst modern zoos and aquaria do borrow some of these concepts from themed attractions in areas such as display and marketing I still feel there is a world of difference between these two entities.

--
 
^ On that topic...

Legoland have just opened an aquarium ride, where the submarine takes you around the tank, its an interesting concept but I expect kids will get distracted by the face your in a submarine that actually looking at (and learning) about the fish.
 
JamesB said:
^ On that topic...

Legoland have just opened an aquarium ride, where the submarine takes you around the tank, its an interesting concept but I expect kids will get distracted by the face your in a submarine that actually looking at (and learning) about the fish.
Click to expand...

Had a look at the web site. As I can glean this isn't a Sea Life Centre as such but a ride which involves a large aquarium.

What's New? - LEGOLAND

Interesting concept but not totally new - Disney anyone:

WALT DISNEY WORLD FLORIDA

Do the submarines actually go underwater or are they going through a tunnel. If they are actually going underwater that's quite impressive although this must have been a H&S nightmare to get licensed.

The Legoland figures look a bit naff in this context but it is a park for families with young children.

---
 
Sealife were most probably involved in setting it up, as Merlin owns both Legoland and Sealife. I'm not actually sure about the ride, I would say its a tunnel but I can't be certain, it looks a very interesting ride, may pop along there one day.
 
So... I had a look around yesterday. It was my first visit to the aquarium.

I thought overall it was a nice aquarium, you can see that Sealife have really got a hold of it and changed it to feel like their other attractions, which in a way doesn't make it stand out from other aquariums. The amazon section and ray bay was very typical Sealife but overall it had a nice feel to it. I was quite impressed by the large shark tank.

I think the new penguin exhibit has replaced the cinema (looking at the old map) its a okay exhibit, the penguins are very active but I can't help feel its a little small, however the water is quite deep. There is very little privacy for them and not a lot of signage about the exhibit, but its an interesting addition, nothing to write home about however.

Thats it, really.
 
It appears that the first indoor gentoo hatching in the UK took place at the London Aquarium last month, and that the chick is being parent-reared:

Itty bitty penguin chick debuts at London aquarium | MNN - Mother Nature Network
SEA LIFE London Aquarium announces the arrival of their first Gentoo Penguin chick! - Merlin Groups

While I dislike intensely the concept of penguins being kept in completely artificial conditions with no access to natural light, I accept that this limits the species that can be maintained in the UK. There are now groups of gentoos in climate-controlled indoor exhibits at The Deep (9 animals from the US) and Birmingham SLC (12 animals from NZ). It will be interesting to note breeding success and mortality over the coming years but, if the London tank is sufficient for them to breed, I imagine the other collections will achieve similar success.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top