Vancouver Aquarium

Muriel Groves introduced our guest speakers from the Vancouver Aquarium Trish Gauntlett and Alisa Coquet. It is the Aquariums 50th birthday. They wanted to share the story of how far the Aquarium has come since it first began with 50 animal species and a 25cent-admission charge. Today they have 400 staff, nearly 800 volunteers and 600 animal species - a total of 70,000 animals. Their mission is for conservation, research, external relations and life long connections. Trish and Alisa provided much insight into their programs and research. In 2006 they released over 100 harbour seals back into their natural habitat after they had recovered from sickness or injury. They partner with restaurants to encourage them to serve more sustainable seafood versus non-sustainable, they partner with the TD Canada Trust shoreline clean up with over 40,000 participants, they have a program called Riverworks - helping to conserve wetlands by removing invasive species and monitoring habitats. They have education programs for schools and pre-schools; clubs and camps for kids; a travelling aquarium they take on the road to Alberta and interior BC so kids can learn about the ocean; kids can have hands on experience releasing salmon fry into streams to learn about conserving our salmon. As we all now realize the Vancouver Aquarium is much more than a display of marine life. Our speakers also provided an update on the expansion of the Aquarium explaining that although the footprint would be extended much of the extension would be underground so not such an impact to the park. They were happy to report that even with the devastation in Stanley Park form the recent storms the Aquarium has been able to remain open and they encouraged us to visit.