SeaWorld Orlando has opened a coral rescue center attraction where theme-park visitors can observe some of the company’s conservation contributions in action.
“It’s fully functional. So if a guest comes in, on any given day, what they’re going to see is the coral biologist doing day-to-day husbandry. They’re going to see them feed the corals. They’re going to see them cleaning the corals. They’re going to be doing health assessments, measurements, you name it, water changes, everything that’s necessary to keep these very sensitive, at-risk animals healthy,” Jim Kinsler, aquarium curator at SeaWorld Orlando, said Friday.
Visitors are “They’re going to be talking directly with the experts. And so they’re going to be able to ask those hard-hitting questions about what’s happening on the reef,” he said.
The center’s corals – 15 different species – were selected and transferred from the nearby Florida Coral Rescue Center to the SeaWorld Coral Rescue Center for care and with the goal of being returned to the Florida reef.
The reef is experiencing stony coral tissue loss disease, a disease with a high mortality rate.
The coral in the center us in a completely artificial environment, Kinsler said, “meaning artificial seawater that’s perfectly formulated for their specifications, as well as full-spectrum lighting. So that’s LED lighting … it mirrors the exact spectrum they need for photosynthesis.”
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Chris Dold, SeaWorld’s chief zoological officer, said the opening of the coral center is another step in being part of a global community of conservation professionals.
“Remember, coral is an animal. And so if you start counting the individual corals here, that number has gone up exponentially in terms of our efforts to care and protect animals around the world,” Dold said. “Conservation research is core to what we do, of course, and so we look forward to the science that will be generated here in partnership with the other organizations focused on this issue, and so many others.”
Also on hand for the ribbon-cutting were Congressman Darren Soto and Andrew Walker, president and CEO of the Fish & Wildlife Foundation of Florida.
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The rescue center is in the domed structure that previously housed the park’s Turtle Trek attraction, an in-the-round, 3-D presentation that opened in 2012. The new workspace is below the floor level, where visitors can look down onto the coral colonies.
“It was a great opportunity to repurpose the area,” Kinsler said. “We rethemed the entire complex to rescue.”
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