Heal the Bay Blog

This post was guest-written by Aaron Kind, our education specialist at the Santa Monica Pier Aquarium. Aaron runs our Aquarium’s lecture series. Here, he writes about an innovative new addition to that program.

Being a talented artist, whose works have hung on my mother’s refrigerator and graced a few bathroom stall walls, I was quite excited to host the Santa Monica Pier Aquarium’s first Artist Night.  The event was meant to reach out to the local artists in the community, and by keeping the RSVP list to a minimum the Aquarium had plenty of room for the artists to set up.  The event received some unexpected advertising; Traffic Queen and Shortcuts author Kajon Cermak of KCRW announced the night on her radio program and The Santa Monica Observer generously devoted an entire page in color to our Artists’ Night flyer. 

The Aquarium’s local species were the models for the night; moray eels, octopus, sharks and moon jellies took center stage for the evening’s festivities. Photographers, painters and even a couple of digital sculptors attended the two-hour event.  For the first hour, the Aquarium lights were dimmed to help photographers reduce glare from the tanks for their shots.  For the second hour, the lights were brought back up and sea stars, sea urchins and other denizens of the deep were placed in bins so painters and sketchers could get an up close look.  A little bit of 60’s beachy rock  ‘n’ roll set the mood for the artists and models alike.  After talking with the participants (the ones without the fins) the Aquarium staff is planning to set another artist night in approximately three months.

 “Tonight is about artists hanging out with other artists,” one woman was overheard saying, and we were excited to offer this great community with a venue to do just that. For further information on upcoming events, visit the Aquarium section on this site. Also, join us on Facebook to view pictures from the night.

Vicki Wawerchak, director of the Santa Monica Pier Aquarium, has been chronicling the process of readying a very special marine artifact for exhibit. Below is the fourth and final installment about the prepping of whale baleen.

Previous installments in this series:

1. A Whale of a Tale (December 22, 2010)

2. Brushing Up On Our Baleen (January 5, 2011)

3. Unraveling the Mysterious Baleen (January 11, 2011)

I hate waiting. Especially if it is for something I am really excited about. So when we finished prepping the baleen for the drying-out process, the next step was to wait. And wait. And wait.

It was a bit easier because I wasn’t going to be at the Aquarium for a few days so I didn’t feel the need to check on it daily. But when I finally returned, I barely set my bag down and turned on the computer before I went to check on our newly prepped specimen.  (Baleen are plates with hard bristles inside a whale’s mouth that trap and filter small organisms for nourishment.)

And to our excitement, the marine artifact was drying perfectly. The bristles were straight, the color was good, and the piece did not curl. Whew! But now we had to wait a few more days before we could take it out of the contraption we designed.  We continued to monitor it daily because as the moisture evaporated from the baleen, the piece shrunk. That meant the C-clamps had to be tightened and the drying rack had to be readjusted.

As a scientist who works with numerous live animals (including humans) every day, I have a few priorities. One is to ensure we provide an inviting, comfortable, safe, learning environment for students, the general public, volunteers and staff. The other is to ensure we provide a safe, healthy, high water quality habitat for all the animals we have on exhibit. From the smallest skeleton shrimp to our biggest bass, we want to make sure that the environment we create mimics their natural one. I do not take these tasks lightly.

The amount of care given to our live animals is replicated with our marine artifacts that we acquire through the many partnerships and relationships we have created through the years. The utmost care, attention to detail and responsibility needs to be executed when prepping and dealing with these artifacts. 

We understand that they were obtained from once-live animals and therefore we have an obligation to make sure we succeed not only in the prepping process, but also in how we use them for education. The room for error is small and at times the need to succeed can be overwhelming.

And succeed we did. We untied the lines that were holding the baleen plates together, carefully removed all the wood that we used to separate the baleen plates and slowly unscrewed the C-clamps.

What was left was a beautifully dried out specimen that is going to enhance our education capabilities. Most of the staff at the Aquarium had never seen a full section of baleen like this before, let alone used one this large as an educational tool. So, I am sure the passion and excitement that each one of them feels will come out when using the artifact to educate the general public about the majestic gray whales that migrate annually right off our beautiful coast.

Please visit the Aquarium during Whale of a Weekend, Feb. 19-20, to view the baleen first hand. Check back after the weekend to read how we used the baleen during education programs and how it was received. 

Vicki Wawerchak, director of the Santa Monica Pier Aquarium, chronicles the process of readying a very special marine artifact for exhibit. Below is the third installment about the prepping of whale baleen, plates of hard bristles inside a whale’s mouth that trap and filter small organisms for nourishment.

Previous installments in this series:

1. A Whale of a Tale (December 22, 2010)

2. Brushing Up On Our Baleen (January 5, 2011)

After the final cleanout of the baleen plates, Aquarium staffers passed around ideas about how best to separate the individual plates to allow for adequate drying. Thoughts included everything from using cardboard, PVC pipe to plastic sheeting. We finally settled on using wood. We inserted the wooden boards carefully, again using the toothbrush to straighten out the individual bristles and to ensure they wouldn’t bend while securing the piece to the drying rack.

Meanwhile, we received an email from our contact at the Marine Mammal Center in Sausalito — the facility that gave us the baleen specimen — with more details about the animal whose baleen will soon be used to educate our visitors.

The carcass of the gray whale, Eschrichtius robustus, was floating between Alcatraz Island and Fort Mason in San Francisco, causing a hazard to vessel traffic in the Bay. The U.S. Coast Guard towed the body to a nearby beach, where Marine Mammal Center staff examined it. They determined the whale to be a juvenile male, estimated to be two to four years old.  While they noted lacerations typical of a great white shark bite, staffers guessed the wounds probably occurred post mortem. Cause of death was undetermined.

With the additional knowledge of the baleen’s origins, we turned our concern back to the specimen. We worried about the baleen curling during the drying process. To prevent this, we secured the whole plate with twine and tied it onto a plastic grating that we elevated on a board. The elevation of the baleen allowed for increased air circulation as well as a way to allow for any dripping that might occur. We then secured two L-shaped brackets on either side of the entire piece and used C-clamps to position the artifact to ensure the shape of the piece would not change as it lost moisture.

As we finished securing the baleen on our homemade drying rack, we moved the piece inside the Aquarium’s Green Room and set it up with a few fans to aid with air circulation and to speed up the drying process. And then the wait began … this step is going to take about two weeks. 

Check back next week to read about the unveiling – and see the final product.

Vicki Wawerchak, director of the Santa Monica Pier Aquarium, chronicles the process of readying a very special marine artifact for exhibit. Below is the second installment about the prepping of whale baleen. (Read the first installment).

Last week, we continued the prepping process for the two baleen segments donated to us by the Marine Mammal Center in Sausalito. Baleen are plates with hard bristles inside a whale’s mouth that trap and filter small organisms for nourishment. These baleen pieces are from a gray whale, Eschrichtius robustus, that was found on April 20, 2010 as a floating carcass between Alcatraz Island and Fort Mason in San Francisco.

After soaking the baleen pieces for three days in freshwater (imagine me opening the lid to the cooler at least twice a day to check on it, did I think it was going to get up and walk away?) we were ready for step two.  This took a few extra hands, so Jose Bacallao, the Aquarium’s senior aquarist, and Aaron Kind, our education specialist, also stepped in. We pulled the smaller of the two plates out of the freshwater and decided to work on one piece first to see if our technique would pan out. You don’t want to make a mistake with something like this.

We planned to clean out any organic material (soft tissue) that might be stuck in between the individual plates. The scientific weapon of choice? Nothing other than a high-tech toothbrush. We used pieces of wood to separate the individual plates, which allowed us to thoroughly clean the material. We got to work brushing the baleen, pulling out organic matter and separating the bristles. We wanted all the plates and bristles to dry straight during the drying out process. After loosening the material, we removed the wood pieces and decided to gently spray the baleen with fresh water and give it one last cleaning.

Now we were ready to figure out how to secure it for the drying process so that it would stay intact, not curl, or become infested with bugs. We brainstormed and came up with about four different techniques, before finally settling on one…

Check back next week to read about the drying process and how well it worked.