Turtle Exhibit at Mall of America?
- This topic has 4 replies, 1 voice, and was last updated 23 years, 6 months ago by
.
-
Posts
-
I just found out about the big turtle exhibit of over 1,100 turtles at the aquarium in the Mall of America in Bloomington, MN. They have quite a web site at http://www.underwaterworld.com/turtles.html The bad news is that this special exhibit closes Monday! Has anyone seen it? Is it worth a trip? ToddDo you Yahoo!? New DSL Internet Access from SBC & Yahoo!
I spoke with someone who went who said it was very impressiv. But this guy is not a real “turtle guy” so he couldn’t tell me if the animals’ condition/cages were acceptable he did say it was very noisy (as one would expect for the mall of america) and that there were a seemingly endless number of turtles. I think therewas a post about this on one of the list or maybe from herpdigest way back in february when it was still in the planning stages. apparently many of the turtles were “wild caught by some of minnesota’s school children” anyway, i still wanted to go but i never made it. I wonder what will happend to all those homeles turtles. -rob Todd Stockwell wrote:
Thanks for the info. Some of your points are referred to on the aquarium’s web site. What will happen after Monday to all of the turtles is not mentioned, however. Todd rob zebeck wrote:
We took a 6 hour ride last weekend to check out the exhibit. There were good points and bad. The number of turtles in each tank made it seem like less than 1,000. The displays varied. There was an ancient looking snapping turtle that was incredible. He was in a decent size display and spends 99% of his time sleeping. There was a very large display of juvenile aquatic turtles, sliders, softshells, etc. that was rather frustrating to watch. The basking “area” was literally a section of log that the turtles were frantically trying to get on top of. As the weight of the turtles on it increased, it rolled over every time, knocking them all back into the water…where the whole process would begin again. There was no way that they could dry off and bask. Then, there was a leopard tortoise…very sad. It was the worst case of pyramiding we have ever seen, and his beak was so overgrown it was pitiful. He was in a fishtank that was maybe 30 gallons…on a bare piece of reptile carpet with one plastic plant in the corner. Possibly the worst thing we saw was a huge mata-mata in what might have been a 75 gallon corner tank. He was almost standing upright in such a small tank and could literally not move at all, but was a very impressive looking turtle. Those were the bad things. On the good side, there were positively huge “tunnel” tanks that you walk through that had several hundred mature semi-aquatic turtles living with an impressive display of native Minnesota fish. The sea turtle display was equally impressive. There is one sea turtle over a hundred pounds that was born with stubbs for flippers. She was rescued on the beach where she was born….unable to make it to the ocean. She’s now huge, happy and healthy living in the aquarium. Also of interest was the baby turtle nursery. On display were newly hatched sliders, mud turtles and snapping turtles. They were displayed in bare trays that were tilted with a small amount of water at the bottom of each. We hope that the temporary nature of the display is the reason for some of the turtles being housed inappropriately. We think perhaps there are other aquatic displays presented in those tanks normally, and they fit what they could in each. We did enjoy our visit, and felt the ride was worth it, but then again it was also our first time at the Mall of America. Cole & Deb — In diamondbackterrapins@y…, rob zebeck
Thanks for the detailed report! I don’t feel as though I’m missing quite as much now. Did you see the diamondback terrapins? The species is listed on the website list as being on display. Do they have any publications on the turtle exhibit for sale in their store? Thanks, Todd cschramm23 wrote:
- The forum ‘Diamondback Terrapins’ is closed to new topics and replies.