Last week, the Gallus family went South for Spring Break (one day of it, anyway), back to Kentucky where we came from almost a hundred years ago. We had the great pleasure of touring the fantastic aquarium in Newport, just across the Ohio River from Cincinnati. Located amidst a plush shopping center "On the Levy", this has to be one of the top (inland) aquariums in the country!

"On the Levy"


One of the first exhibits is this large, colorful collection of Cichlids from Lake Malawi in Africa. Some of you Tilapia-owning PMs may recognize something in here.


More Cichlids here, these from Central America IIRC. My kids thought the bulbous headed striped fellow in the center looked like Grandma. Based on info from the 1995 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition, I believe it is a Guapote. The males get this big growth on the forehead once they reach a foot long or so.


The bad news was we were there on Tuesday, and these Piranha only get fed on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. So I can state that no cows were eaten by fish during the duration of our visit to Newport. BTW, these guys are about 10" long!


They had about a dozen of these Pacu, which must have weighed at least 10 pounds apiece. Based on the shape and fin configuration, I think they are related to the Piranha.


The aquarium has a big tank 50 or 60 feet long showing fish from the greater Mississippi basin, including these 4 or 5 foot long sturgeons.


One disappointment was the BG - I suppose that is an understandable hazard for Pond Boss types! I spent the last month before the trip to Kentucky taking winterkilled BG bigger than these out of my pond. On second thought, since these BG were alive, they weren't as disappointing as my dead ones.

I am not sure what the big dark fish on the right side of the picture is. It was rather carpish looking, but had no barbels on its mouth. Maybe a buffalo or drum?


There were about a dozen Gators (and BG and RES and Flatheads) in a big tank that you walk over the top of. One of them was enjoying this Cajun home theater system.


This Alligator Snapping Turtle is almost the size of a bushel basket and is supposed to weigh 148 pounds!


There is also a large marine fish section at the aquarium, including an ersatz coral reef that had at least some actual live coral in it, and these neat fish.


"See the fish in the reef
With the sharp, shiny teeth?
That's a Moray!"
(We got some funny looks from other aquarium goers for singing to the eel.)


The Newport Aquarium also features a nifty frog exhibit which has a number of poison arrow frogs, tree frogs, oddball North American frogs, and these Tomato Frogs (which actually get better than any tomato I've ever seen).


They have a walk-in aviary where you can feed (Australian) Lorikeets (take an umbrella!) and a small number of snakes including this rather large Burmese Python.


In my mind the biggest thrill was the shark tank, which is two stories tall and on the order of 3000 square feet in area. If you look in the back of this shot from a observation bubble, you can see the tunnel you walk underneath the sharks to get through.


There is a pretty neat sea turtle in with the sharks, rays, and other species of fish in the shark tank.


I don't know what this ugly guy is, although from the similarity his fins have to tuna, I suspect he may swim fairly fast. His face looked like Mr. Collier, the Vice Principal at my old High School.

The fish didn't have any hair, either.


There were several species of rays and about a dozen different kinds of sharks in the tank. The biggest shark was 8 or 9 feet long.

Feeding time for the sharks was 1:30 PM, but we saw three of them that helped themselves to some of their tankmates rather than wait for their scheduled lunch of squid and dead fish.


The last exhibit was a dry land/swimming tank penguin exhibit with Kings and Gentoos. FYI, feeding time for the penguins is 2:30 PM.


I would highly recommend the Newport Aquarium to any PM who can make it the Cincinnati area. I am sure you will have as big a blast as I did (it took me a week to winnow through the almost 360 pictures I took while we were there and get this post prepared). The rest of the family enjoyed it too.

Admission is $21 per person and tickets are available on line. Garage parking is located within a hundred yards or so of the Aquarium.

Nice report! Your daughter looks like she's holding a live animal?

What did the sharks help themselves to? Did you witness the shear brutality?

She smuggled one of the River Otters out of the North American exhibit. We're keeping it in the bathtub and feeding it Bullheads until I can drop it off in a nice, new home near Somerset, PA. I think it likes Wipers and Smallies.

I didn't see the fish free-swimming before the sharks had them, but Fish Wife did. The one I got the best look at (they eat pretty fast) was maybe 8"-9" long.

Did you guys take the PU truck or the yellow Bluebird?

I thought she was taking it home to the Gallus pond to practice her new skills upon. Oh the brutality !

I second that aquarium as being well worth the admission. They have really tried to revitalize Newport on the Levee. I also recommend the Haufbraugh (sp) Hausse for dinner.
I relived my vacation there with your pics. Thanks.

Jonesy

Nice post and great pics! Those Lake Malawi fish are neat. My adviser at Penn State is a leading researcher in Lake Malawi fish. Pretty cool species there!

Theo:

I've been to the Shedd in Chicago, the one in LaJolla, a and Monterey bay, Ca. Of those 3, the Monterey Bay one was the best, closely followed by Shedd. Have you been to the Shedd in Chicago?

Did dinner at the Hofbrauhaus a couple of times in the past 4 years. Agreed; ditto the recommendation. Super food and atmosphere. Too bad I gave up beer.

Neat pics, Theo. I'll admit it...I laughed at the "that's a Moray!" joke.

That looks like a neat place!

Has anyone been to the aquarium in Atlanta? I've heard it is spectacular, but at 9 hours drive... I wanna make sure it really is worth the time.

outahere

sure would like to see that cichlid display!!

thanks for sharing that theo.

that alligator snapper is a real beast.

Greg Grimes knows crappie.




Thanks Bruce. If anyone makes it out to Atlanta you can see them in person, those two are now swimming in the world's largest aquarium.

http://www.pondboss.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=62546&fpart=8

I've fished at Shawnee before. Really nice park.

Do you remember the big ship restaurant on the side of Route 30?

And Theo, BTW, your son looks like he's really having a wonderful time!

That thrilled-with-life look comes with Senioritis. Your kids will be teenagers soon enough, Sunil.

Bski:

Fish Wife's Crew Cab.

Today's vocabulary lesson:

Word: ob·ses·sion
Function: noun
Date: 1680

1: a persistent disturbing preoccupation with an often unreasonable idea or feeling ; broadly : compelling motivation

Use in a conversation:

Speaker 1: I think Theo has an obsession with fish.

Speaker 2: What makes you say that?

Speaker 1: He took a break from his pond boss moderator duties to visit an aquarium.

Obsession.

Theo, pacu are related to piranha, but their similar appearance is due mostly to mimicry. The younger pacu are excellent red bellied piranha mimics. As pacu grow larger, the piranha mimicry largely disappears.

Looks like fun! I went to a small aquarium in New Orleans Audubon Zoo years ago, and it was enjoyable. We now have the "Aquarium of the Americas" that I must visit some day. It's supposed to be huge and spectacular.

-
Bill Cody notes in another current thread

...I can't wait for the daily calendar to be published

I hear its pretty neat, I used to date a girl that now works there. She also spent a summer working at the aquarium in Chattanoogo. They have a really neat exhibit in Chattanooga, as you walk through the aquarium it is liking taking a trip from the Tennessee river headwater streams all the way to the gulf of mexico. So the tanks start with minnows from streams and continue on down the river, through the impoundments to the Misssissippi River and then the saltwater gulf of Mexico tank.

While I was there I got to do all the behind the scenes stuff, including feeding most of the fish. Nothing quite like having an 8 foot sturgeon sucking your hand into its mouth. Feeding 3 lb crappies in the Reelfoot lake tank was kinda cool too.

There's a lot of good usable material in your post, csteffen, but .....must restrain self.....must restrain.....

lemme know if'n ya need a hand, Sunil

I won't be offended. I know how the forum operates...

The Ship Hotel! Always stopped for ice cream on the way back from fishing. I googled it and found out it burned-down in 2001. What a sight that ship was on top of the mountain!

It was super cool. My grandfather used to take me there as a kid when we were in the area.

CJBS2003

About 6 months ago I was able to spend 2-3 of the most relaxing hours that I can remenber at the aquarium in Atlanta. I do a good bit of business travel and have had the opportunity to see the aquariums in Monterey, La Jolla, Baltimore, Ripley's in Myrtle Beach as well as the new(er) aquarium at the Pittsburgh Zoo. Hands down Atlanta was the most impressive.

My favorite exhibits were the Beluga Whales and most notably the salt water reef display where you can sit in front of a very large salt water tank with an incoming tide and thousands marine fish of every shape, size and color combination imaginable.

The others have similar exhibits but on a much, much smaller scale. Think 19" portable color TV vs a 72" HD flat panel

That's what I had heard as well... Thanks for the personal experience sharing. Looks like I am going to have to make a trip down the Atlanta this summer and drag the girl with me!

You won't regret it - it's great......

My catfish tourney has 2 tix for the Newport Aquarium as door prizes tomorrow and Id like to win them. I have been there a dozen times but always enjoy Aquariums, I used to travel for a living and would spend weekend at far, far away plaes and woud always go to aquariums and zoo's.
That said, the Chattanooga ( worlds largest freshwater aquarium) is by far the neatest one i ever been to, the Shedd in Chi town is cool also. After that would probably be Monteray and then Baltimore, and fianlly on ein Wash DC somewhere. forget Dallas, houston, one in LA and one somewhere In Florida, they blew....werent worth the money to get into and my clients were footing the bill even...


Salmonid

Looking at the sign-in book for that ship/hotel was pretty cool. They had some notable names in there though I can't remember who. Supposedly it was celebs from the 1930s to 1950s or so.

One time I was in there during one of the many iterations of operating a business, and I went to the rest room which was under the main floor. After the restroom, I walked down the hall and opened a few doors and it was like stepping back in time. The rooms hadn't been touched in years. Old furniture, odd fish-torture mechanisms, etc. It was wild.

outahere

There's about a dozen covered bridges within a half hour of our hunting property in Bedford Co. A number of them have been refurbished in recent years.

outahere

Blue Knob, highest skiable point in PA...