South Carolina Aquarium South Carolina Aquarium trip report - 24 Nov 2024

SwampDonkey

SwampDonkey

In the Swamp
Premium Member
5+ year member
I had a brief three night stop in Charleston on my way up to North Carolina. I had not been in Charleston for around 25 years, and it was nice to be back. While there we stopped at both the Charles Town Landing and South Carolina Aquarium. I probably won't do a review of Charles Town Landing, but the small "Animal Forest" was really nicely done and the whole facility is worth a stop if you have an interest in either animals or history, of which I am interested in both.

Tickets vary by day, but they seem to be between $29-$35. That's pretty standard it seems. No AZA discounts.

The SCA was actually much nicer than I had anticipated. I had anticipated a fairly small facility, maybe an hour or so. We ended up being there about 2.5 hours, with about 20 minutes of that devoted to the kids play area.

My pictures will have come holiday decorations as they have an evening event during this time of year and the aquarium is decorated accordingly.
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One enters on the second level, up a set of stairs after paying at the booth. I am not sure what is on the first level, but it does not seem to be open to the public. Upon entering the actual aquarium you first see a large tank called "Carolina Seas", after viewing that you proceed up an escalator or elevator to begin the tour on the second level.

Carolina Seas:
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After ascending the escalator you are presented with the entrance to "Mountains" and a indoor bald eagle enclosure:
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Mountains is done really well, the entry is through a cave and you immediately come to several trout tanks and a waterfall followed by North American river otters in a decent enclosure.
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After the otters you enter a set of doors into an "inside" area with much less theming. Mostly side wall tanks for various Carolina fish and herps. The tanks are themed for areas such as brown and black water swamps, reservoirs, shoals, etc. Each tank has it's own theme, so the area is solidly all about the Piedmont/mountain area, but the theme is broad.

The Blackwater Swamp tank is the largest in this area:
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Piedmont River:
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There is a tank for American Alligators (Freshwater Swamp), but I only saw one very small gator and the entire tank is not that large and could not accommodate a much larger gator.
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Leaving the Mountains area takes you into the largest part of the aquarium, Oceans. This area holds the largest tank in the aquarium, the Ocean tank. That tank was well done, with a large viewing window spanning two levels with several different observation angles. Nothing of particular note, tarpon, sand tiger sharks, barracuda, and the normal assortment of jacks and such. This area also has smaller tanks for "Sargassum" and then a long wall for Atlantic reefs.
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Departing Ocean on the first floor takes you into the sea turtle rehab area. This is a large area with some really well done hands on sea turtle rescue exhibits and viewing into the turtle rehab tanks.

Disappointingly one has to backtrack back to the second level unless you did not descend to the first floor while viewing the large tank in the Ocean area. That fact should have been much better signed.

Back on level 2 is the last area the "Saltmarsh" which is a combo aviary and fish. I only saw two spoonbills, but they may have more birds. This area has loads of puffer fish and rays. Just outside the aviary are two touch tanks with chain catshark and the other tank had the usual assortment of urchins and such. The shark touch tank was a really nice touch.
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Just outside the touch tanks were a set of tanks for octopus, mantis shrimp, slipper lobster, and goliath grouper.
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All in all this was a fun aquarium and I love the focus on the Carolinas. This area focus is something that a lot of aquariums are getting away from, and I wish they would not. I would recommend that if you like aquariums and you are in the area it is worth seeing. Charleston itself is a charming city and worth a trip, and the aquarium is located conveniently in the main tourist area.
 
Glad you enjoyed it! I'm not the biggest fan of South Carolina Aquarium, probably for a combination of factors. It's about as far from me as the substantially more impressive Georgia and Tennessee Aquariums, but more than that I've seen its collection dwindle over the years, which has been hugely disappointing. I don't think you're wrong about the saltmarsh, which had previously been my favorite area, being down to a very paltry number of birds. It wasn't even that many years ago that it held a much wider array of spoonbills, ibises, pelicans, egrets, and ducks. Similarly, the blackwater swamp tank used to hold an adult alligator (memory tells me that the glass barrier used to be a bit different), and I've definitely seen the smaller freshwater swamp tank with perhaps 3-5 juvenile alligators at once before as well. The aquarium also used to house more arboreal mammals (ring-tailed lemurs and I believe either raccoons or opossums) and a small terrestrial herp collection as you approach what is now the turtle rescue area. Still, your photos definitely remind me why I love the mountain area in particular so much, it's very immersive and relaxing and I wish it were just a bit larger.
 
Thanks very much for the great review and accompanying photos. I visited the South Carolina Aquarium in 2012 and enjoyed the facility. It only opened in 2000 and so everything there is mainly of a decent standard, although I feel a bit sorry for that Bald Eagle sitting on its perch with 500,000 visitors filing past each year. The Ocean Tank and Mountains galleries are nicely done, as is most of the aquarium to be honest. When I was there they had just opened a Madagascar-themed area with Ring-tailed Lemurs, a Nile Crocodile, Vasa Parrots and 8 smaller species, but that area is gone now. What replaced it?
 
snowleopard said:
When I was there they had just opened a Madagascar-themed area with Ring-tailed Lemurs, a Nile Crocodile, Vasa Parrots and 8 smaller species, but that area is gone now. What replaced it?
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A turtle rescue station. Very educational, but not the most visually appealing area, particularly for repeat visitors. They'll typically have 4 or so green sea turtles in small quarantine tanks.
 
There is an area on the current map labeled as "Renovations in Progress" and blocked by plywood walls, can anyone comment on what was there before? Maybe it was there?
 

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biggest_dreamer said:
A turtle rescue station. Very educational, but not the most visually appealing area, particularly for repeat visitors. They'll typically have 4 or so green sea turtles in small quarantine tanks.
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Yeah, they had green and loggerhead this trip. My son (7 years old) loved that area, but it would be repetitive for anyone going back and for adults maybe worth a few minutes.
 
biggest_dreamer said:
Glad you enjoyed it! I'm not the biggest fan of South Carolina Aquarium, probably for a combination of factors. It's about as far from me as the substantially more impressive Georgia and Tennessee Aquariums, but more than that I've seen its collection dwindle over the years, which has been hugely disappointing. I don't think you're wrong about the saltmarsh, which had previously been my favorite area, being down to a very paltry number of birds. It wasn't even that many years ago that it held a much wider array of spoonbills, ibises, pelicans, egrets, and ducks. Similarly, the blackwater swamp tank used to hold an adult alligator (memory tells me that the glass barrier used to be a bit different), and I've definitely seen the smaller freshwater swamp tank with perhaps 3-5 juvenile alligators at once before as well. The aquarium also used to house more arboreal mammals (ring-tailed lemurs and I believe either raccoons or opossums) and a small terrestrial herp collection as you approach what is now the turtle rescue area. Still, your photos definitely remind me why I love the mountain area in particular so much, it's very immersive and relaxing and I wish it were just a bit larger.
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Your experience is similar to how I feel about ZooTampa, in regards to species lost.
 
SwampDonkey said:
There is an area on the current map labeled as "Renovations in Progress" and blocked by plywood walls, can anyone comment on what was there before? Maybe it was there?
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Was this area not roughly where the alligators were? That and a handful of amphibians seems correct to me.

And looking over a few maps, it seems like I was mixing up two distinct eras for the now-turtle rescue. It had previously been the Madagascar area, then was a South Carolina wilderness themed area with their eagle, owls, and skunks (I was bound to get the right member of the roadkill squad if I had kept guessing).
 
Here's the aquarium map when I visited the facility in 2012, complete with the new Madagascar Journey zone:

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Here's what I typed out in my review:

Madagascar Journey – This is a brand-new gallery that opened in 2012, and there are many average exhibits amongst some innovative and popular items such as a pop-up bubble in the lemur exhibit; a couple of large fish tanks; a safari jeep that kids can clamber into; and décor that makes it appear as if visitors are at first walking through someone’s house. This area is not large, and the Nile croc does not have a great deal of space, but it certainly had visitors reading the signs and being entertained by the lemurs. Species list: ring-tailed lemur (4 on loan from Duke Lemur Center), vasa parrot, Nile crocodile, Madagascar hissing cockroach, common spider tortoise, Madagascar tree boa, tomato frog, Madagascar giant hognose snake, green mantilla frog, Madagascar day gecko and Madagascar leaf-tailed gecko.
 
SC Aquarium is always weird to me because as an aquarium in general it gets outshined by Ripley’s to the North and Georgia to the South. As a Carolinas-focused aquarium it competes with the much cheaper admission of the similar quality North Carolina Aquariums. It’s the best zoological facility in Charleston by some margin but it just doesn’t compete well within its region.
 
Persephone said:
SC Aquarium is always weird to me because as an aquarium in general it gets outshined by Ripley’s to the North and Georgia to the South. As a Carolinas-focused aquarium it competes with the much cheaper admission of the similar quality North Carolina Aquariums. It’s the best zoological facility in Charleston by some margin but it just doesn’t compete well within its region.
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I have not been to the other aquariums you listed, other than Georgia - so I can't compare. Georgia is a pretty good hike from Charleston, but Ripley's and the NC aquariums are good comparisons. It is the best zoological facility in Charleston, so that's something. I would rate it a solid 6.5 on a 10 point scale.
 
SwampDonkey said:
I have not been to the other aquariums you listed, other than Georgia - so I can't compare. Georgia is a pretty good hike from Charleston, but Ripley's and the NC aquariums are good comparisons. It is the best zoological facility in Charleston, so that's something. I would rate it a solid 6.5 on a 10 point scale.
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I’ve only been to two of the three NC aquariums but they’re also solid 6.5-7.5 aquariums held up by being ridiculously cheap compared to other aquariums ($12.95) and a cool focus on the coastal area they’re located in.
 
Having been to SCA, Ripley’s Myrtle Beach, and the NC Aquarium at Fort Fisher, I’d place SCA squarely in the middle of those. It has one very technically impressive tank (the giant ocean tank with their large sharks that’s the deepest in North America at ~42 feet) but in terms of rarities, expansiveness, and overall exhibitry, Ripley’s is superior. Ripley’s also has the advantage of a genuinely massive rescue and research facility just down the street that you can get into for a small fee, which basically doubles the size of the aquarium.

That being said I really had a good time at SCA. I think it could be greatly improved if they add a unique pelagic species in the largest tank, as it probably could handle it. There’s probably more novelty in it for me though, as I’m a Californian lol.
 
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Local_Shark said:
in terms of rarities, expansiveness, and overall exhibitry, Ripley’s is superior.
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The only Ripley's that i have been to was Toronto, and it fits that outline too. It was one of my favorite aquariums, I loved the Canada area, the whole place was really well done.
 
SwampDonkey said:
The only Ripley's that i have been to was Toronto, and it fits that outline too.
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I definitely recommend checking out the Myrtle Beach one if you’re in the area at any point. You should spring for the full package to go see the research facility as well, that area is amazing in terms of size as well as some of the work they’re doing and the animals present. When I went there in 2022, they had a largetooth sawfish (Pristis pristis) in the main aquarium, and in the offsite section they also had two green sawfish (P. zijsron) from the Canada facility that they were trying to breed. Two for one haha!
 
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