During our stay in Seward, the weather was less than desireable most days, so we found things to do indoors. (not that we usually let it stop us, but it was really cold down by the bay) One of the attractions in town is the Sea Life Center. This is Alaska's only public aquarium. It is a great way to connect with some of Alaska's marine wildlife. We have become particularly fond of the puffins. They are incredibly cute and we also learned that they really prefer to be under water rather than above. A puffin can swim as far as 200 feet deep to look for food. The little guy pictured above is the "tufted puffin".The Sea Life Center had many areas for viewing birds and mammals as well as other sea life. There were typically two levels for viewing; the upper level where the birds were found, also had a lower level where you could view the puffins diving and swimming under water. Those little guys can go pretty fast!
The second species pictured above is the "horned puffin" They like to dive and swim under water as well. It was nice to have the opportunity to see them up close.
There were many varieties of ducks, like this beautiful specimen below.
Look close..... it is a fish!
There were so many sea life varieties, that it was very hard to focus in on all of them.
What a creature - Looked exactly like a feather.
 |
The Stellar Sea Lion is most interesting. The bulls weigh up to 2400 pounds. The one we viewed was happy to swim from top to bottom gracefully and give us a look as we stood on the lower level of the aquarium. The Stellar sea lion has attracted considerable attention due to an unexplained decline in numbers in recent decades; particularly along the Aleutian Islands. It is estimated their numbers have fallen between 70-80%. They have been listed as an endangered species.
Below is the view of Reserrection Bay from the observation platform at the Sea Life Center. The water looked like glass that day.
No comments:
Post a Comment