Pacific Currents

Learn about current expeditions and a recent gathering of ocean explorers.

Learn about the Aquarium’s ocean exploration programming and new Wonders of the Deep exhibit opening this summer. New programs include films, lectures, and live feeds from exploration vessels at sea.

Learn about the Aquarium’s harbor seals and California sea lions. These marine mammals have adaptations that help them live in cold ocean waters and take long, deep dives in pursuit of food. In Animal Updates, read about new arrivals at the Aquarium, including a Black-Backed Magpie, Collared Aracari, Laughing Kookaburra, and flamboyant cuttlefish. The Focus on Sustainability column covers the winter rainy season in Southern California and how it creates storm water runoff that carries trash and other pollution from city streets into waterways and eventually into the ocean.

Learn about the robust collection of birds at the Aquarium of the Pacific, including diving birds, shorebirds, lorikeets, and birds of prey. In Animal Updates, read about Bixby the harbor seal pup, Betty the sea otter, and a breeding pair of Guam Micronesian Kingfishers recently put on public exhibit. The Focus on Sustainability column covers resources for locating Southern California’s marine protected areas and learning the regulations that govern them. In Conservation Corner, learn about local seabirds and the threats they face in the wild.

Penguins are found on four continents in the Southern Hemisphere and live in regions that range from the cold and icy Antarctic to the warm and temperate shores of South Africa and the Galapagos Islands. Learn about the variety of the world’s penguins and the Magellanic Penguins that will make their home at the Aquarium.

Marine invertebrate animals range from the simple sponge to the sophisticated octopus, but they all have one thing in common: no backbone.

Most of our energy use results in carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to climate change. Some of this carbon dioxide is also absorbed by the ocean and could cause lasting changes to ocean chemistry and biology.

Learn how warmer temperatures in the Arctic and Antarctic are causing environmental changes that affect the regions’ plants, animals, and people.

Discover the role the Gulf of Mexico plays in our nation’s economy, food supply, and environmental stability. Also, learn about the impacts of last year’s oil spill and whether or not the Gulf will recover.

In this issue, explore Southern California’s coastal ocean, a place of intense interaction between humans and the sea. Find out what makes this place so different and what we can do to balance the needs of people and nature.