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"COST: $16 million
OPENED: April 1, 1995
The 71,000 square foot Walter and Suzanne Scott Kingdoms of the Seas Aquarium features realistic displays of aquatic habitats from polar regions, temperate oceans, coral reefs and the Amazon. Walking through the aquarium offers visitors a number of unique and exciting experiences.
Penguins and Puffins
After a visual display of underwater scenes in the lobby, visitors can see Arctic puffins in an above- and below-water exhibit featuring a 20-foot high cliff nesting site.
The Antarctic penguins can be seen through a 60-foot long, 25-foot high window extending both above and below water. The exhibit includes Antarctic rock, water and man-made snow, all kept at a temperature between 30 - 35 degrees Fahrenheit. This exhibit is capable of producing 20 tons of man-made snow per day using four snow machines. Penguins, ranging from king penguins (as tall as a five-year-old child) and gentoo penguins, to little rockhopper penguins, inhabit this frigid environment.
Little blue penguins, native to the warmer climate of Australia, are displayed outside the aquarium in the warmer months. Their exhibit includes many nest boxes and places to burrow as well as natural vegetation and a salt-water pool.
Ongoing reproductive efforts are made for all species of penguins and puffins. In cases where parents abandon the egg or if a cracked egg is found, the egg is taken behind the scenes. Here, it is placed in an incubator. Five days prior to the hatch date the egg is developed enough to be moved to the hatchery. After the chick is hatched it will be moved to a brooder where it is kept warm during its growing process. The chick is monitored until it is too large for the brooder or is large enough to be at room temperature. When the chick has its adult plumage, it can be moved to the exhibit. Chicks in the hatchery can sometimes be seen via video monitor at the Antarctic penguin exhibit.
Shark Tunnel
One highlight of the Scott Aquarium is an underwater stroll on the ocean floor. Visitors will wind their way through an oval-shaped, 70-foot long, zig-zag acrylic tunnel that takes them past coral heads, canyons and caves. This tunnel, at the bottom of a 17 foot deep exhibit, allows visitors the experience of being on the ocean floor with large sharks and rays swimming past them on two sides and overhead. This system contains over 900,000 gallons of circulating salt water (half is on display, the other half is within the filtration and support systems). The temperature of the water is 77 degrees Fahrenheit. The exhibit can also be seen through a large flat viewing window and a six-foot diameter acrylic bubble inside an underwater cave.
Additional Exhibits
A seven-foot high acrylic window gives a close-up view of a giant Pacific octopus and cold water anemones. See colorful fish and invertebrates from above and below water at the Sulawesi black-sand beach. The Symbiotic exhibit shows visitors how symbiotic relationships between animals can help each animal survive. Visitors can see these relationships in a way that can only otherwise been seen while scuba diving. Two floor to ceiling cylinders feature moon jellies and open ocean schooling fish. The Omaha Zoo has an extensive, ongoing propagation program for its moon jellies and corals that is shared with other public aquariums.
Other exhibits include a 36,000 gallon small shark exhibit and five jewel tanks, which contain nautilus, fishes with natural defense systems, moray eels, weedy and leafy seadragons and a living coral reef. The Indo-Pacific Reef features the colorful creatures that live in warm, shallow waters. The Ocean Oddities display shows unusual looking marine life, rarely seen in large exhibits. Fish, invertebrates, turtles and mammals are featured among submerged trees and roots in the flooded Amazon forest . The Amazon is the aquarium's only freshwater display."