Closed for the Season

Due to the hurricane this past weekend, we had to empty the Portsmouth touch tank and unfortunately will not be reopening for the last week of the 2011 season. Hopefully you got a chance to visit us earlier in the summer and enjoy some of the creatures from the Gulf of Maine. See you next year!

Update Re: Hurricane Irene

We're taking precautions due to Hurricane/Tropical Storm Irene and will be putting the tank in storage at least while the weather passes - so the tank will be closed from this afternoon (Saturday) until further notice. Will keep you posted!

Periwinkles!

Our featured creature at the Portsmouth touch tank this week is the periwinkle! Our junior intern, Willy Jones, wrote a great article about these animals in this month's Blue Ocean Society e-newsletter, which can be found here: http://www.enewsarchive.com/blueoceansociety .

We had some great periwinkle-themed crafts at the touch tank today, thanks to our intern, Callie! Today was her last day as she heads back to school next week - a big thanks to Callie and all of our touch tank interns and volunteers for their help this summer!

Mummichogs

We had some great visitors at the touch tank today, along with wonderful weather! We have quite a few mummichogs in the tank right now, in addition to lobsters, crabs, hermit crabs, sea urchins, moon snails, and sea anemones.

Stop by this week to visit these fish or any of our other great creatures! We are open Wed-Sun from 8:30 am to 2 pm.

Creature feature August 15-21

We have two featured creatures at the Portsmouth touch tank this week!

The first is the sand shrimp, which is a small species of shrimp common on the Atlantic coast. They have one pair of hook-shaped claws and are one of the dominant predators in the benthic (sea bottom) community. In the summer, they are found in shallow waters, and in the winter they migrate into deeper waters.

The second creature this week is the mummichog, which is a small fish that also lives in shallow waters along the east coast of North America. Its Native American name means "they go in great numbers." These fish feed on insects, small fish, crustaceans, and plants. They are an important food source for larger fish species.

Lobster week

Lobster week at the touch tank was a success! We now have 4 of these creatures in the tank, of various sizes. Although they typically scavenge at night, we actually got some of these animals to eat mussels on Saturday afternoon! Thanks to all of our visitors this past week - we hope to see you again soon!

Lobsters!

In honor of our new additions to the touch tank, this week's featured creature is the lobster! We have two little lobsters in Portsmouth right now, as well as some new crabs, limpets, and sea urchins! Here is the bigger of our two lobsters, hiding between his favorite rocks!

We had some great visitors today at that tank - here is Michael, age 2.5, with a moon snail shell, and with his favorite touch tank creature: the periwinkle!

Stop by to see our lobsters and the rest of our great marine life at the Blue Ocean Society touch tank in Portsmouth!

Thank you, Treehouse Toys!

Treehouse Toys, located at 143 Market Street in Portsmouth, NH, just became a Silver Sponsor of our Portsmouth Touch Tank! A big thank you to them for helping us continue to educate our visitors and hopefully inspire them to conserve the marine environment! Be sure to visit Treehouse Toys and thank them for their contribution! Their hours are:

Mon - Thur 10am - 6pm
Fri - Sat 10am - 8pm
Sun 10am-6pm

A week full of echinoderms!

This week's creature feature is the echinoderm. Echinoderms include sea stars, sea urchins, and sand dollars. The word echinoderm comes from the Greek words for "spiny" and "skin." Echinoderms are the largest phylum (group of related animals) that has no freshwater or terrestrial species!

All adult echinoderms have pentaradial, or 5-sided, symmetry. There creatures are often known for their ability to regenerate body parts - in some species, a single arm can develop into a complete individual!

For the chance to observe and hold an echinoderm or any of the other amazing creatures currently living in our touch tank, stop by the Isles of Shoals dock in downtown Portsmouth from Wed-Sun from 8:30 am to 2 pm!!

Crab week at the touch tank!

This week at the Portsmouth touch tank, our featured creature is the crab! Just in time to celebrate, we noticed one of our female crabs is carrying bright orange eggs!

We will have to keep a close eye on her, and hopefully we will have some new baby crabs by the end of the summer!

Stop by Wed-Sun between 8:30 am and 2 pm to see this crab or any of our others - we have jonah crabs, rock crabs, green crabs, and asian shore crabs in the tank right now! Hope to see you soon.

Can you find our flounder?

The winter flounder uses its fins to cover its body in sand. This fish is able to camouflage so well that sometimes it's hard to even spot him in the tank! Can you find him in both of these photos?

July 13-17 is Flounder Week!

We have a very friendly winter flounder in our Portsmouth Touch Tank. At feeding times, he has even been known to eat right out of your hand!

Winter flounder is a type of flatfish. In the Gulf of Maine, it is the most common shallow water flounder. It can be distinguished from the summer flounder because winter flounder have eyes on the right side of their bodies and they have no teeth.

If you would like to see this week's featured creature for yourself, come

visit our touch tank this Wednesday-Thursday from 8:30 am - 2 pm at 315 Market St!

Hermit Crab moving day

I know this week is supposed to be all about frilled anemones at the touch tank, but it seems the hermit crabs weren't ready to let go of their time in the spotlight! Today we had a very exciting event - one of our large hermit crabs switched his shell!

Because hermit crabs don't grow their own hard shells like other crabs, they live in empty shells from other animals, such as dogwelks and moon snails, to protect themselves. The hermit crab today carefully inspected one of the empty shells in the tank, turning it over with its claws many times to make sure it would make a suitable home. It then left the safety of its original shell and moved over into the new shell! We don't get to see this event very often, so our visitors today were very lucky to witness the show. A big thanks to Emma and Scott Watson for visiting our tank two days in a row!

Kids: Join us for our Sea Star Camp July 19 and 21!

Looking for something fun for your 3-6 year old?  To earn their Silver Award, a team of Hampton Cadette Girl Scouts is partnering with Blue Ocean Society to offer Sea Star Camp.  Camp will be held at the Blue Ocean Touch Tank and on board the docked MV Thomas Laighton in Portsmouth.  Two sessions are offered, Tuesday July 19^th and  Thursday July 21^st.  Camp runs from 9-11:30am both days.  The sessions offer activities and hands on education with the sea animals in the touch tank.  Cost is $10 per session and includes a t-shirt.  Registration form can be found here  or call 603-431-0260 for more information.

This week at the Touch Tank: Frilled Anemones

Come visit the anemones in the Portsmouth Touch Tank this week! Frilled anemones use their tentacles to feed on small zooplankton in the water.

Join us at the Isles of Shoals Steamship Company Dock in this great summer weather to gently touch and hold some of our plants and animals in the touch tank. Along with this week's featured creature the anemone, we also have a winter flounder, a sculpin, and many crabs, hermit crabs, and sea stars.

June 29th at the touch tank

We had a great day at the marine life touch tank today! Thanks to everyone who stopped by to visit our creatures and enter the NH Coastal Cleanup art contest! In honor of hermit crab week, here are some pictures from today at the tank:

Here is our smallest hermit crab, right next to our littlest sea star!

One of our new periwinkles is hitching a ride on the shell of another of our hermit crabs!

Visit our Hermit Crabs!

This week, our featured creature at the touch tank is the hermit crab! Right now we have 6 hermit crabs of all different sizes living in our tank. Here is one eating lunch from earlier today!

We are now open for our regular summer hours, Wed-Sun from 8:30 am - 2 pm. Stop by this week to hold one of our hermit crabs or other tide pool critters, hear a story about hermit crabs, or do a fun craft!

Hope to see you soon!

Looking for Volunteers at the Touch Tank!

Are you interested in marine life? Do you have some time to spare this summer? We're looking for volunteers to help at the marine life touch tank!


Under the supervision of our touch tank coordinator, volunteers teach kids and adults who visit the tank all about the local marine ecosystem. They also care for and handle the creatures of the tank, including sea stars, urchins, anemones, crabs, marine snails, and other invertebrates. You will also have the opportunities to lead story times and other activities.

Volunteers should be friendly, hard-working and enthusiastic about our mission: to inspire passion in people to conserve the marine environment.

The application process is easy! For more information, click here.

Marine Life Touch Tank 2011 Grand Opening

Saturday June 25^th       8:30 am – 2 pm

Isles of Shoals Steamship Co. Dock

315 Market Street

Portsmouth, NH

See and gently hold animals & plants from the Gulf of Maine!                          

  Special Activities:

9:30 - Creature Feature

11:00 – Feeding Time

11:30 - Critter Scavenger Hunt

12:00 - Arts and Crafts

12:30 – Story Time

FREE! (although we appreciate a donation of $3 per person)

Join Us June 18-19!

Our official grand opening will be on June 25, but this weekend, we'll be doing a "soft opening" of the touch tank. Join us Saturday and Sunday, June 18-19 from 8:30 AM-2 PM to check out our new critters!

Preview of the New Touch Tank Animals!

Here's a closer peek at what we've gotten in the touch tank so far. We've been working hard to get the touch tank up and running, sending down SCUBA divers and tide pooling a lot and it's nearly ready! We have already gathered lots of animals but we will be adding new animals all summer so it's a good excuse to visit more than once. We have got a large variety of sea stars in the tank including some blood stars! We were also given a couple of small scallops which are fun to watch swim!

We have all kinds of crabs in the tank already and all sizes; a few hermit

crabs along with green

crabs, jonah crabs, rock crabs, and Asian shore crabs!

We also have tons of mussels in the tank which means we have lots of different things growing on them. This includes

the under appreciated barnacles which can often be seen feeding if you look closely. And while you're looking you can see the mussels filter feeding the water as well. Also growing on some of our mussels are some bright orange sea anemones!

There are lots more things in the tank other than what you've seen here and always more to come, so be sure to come visit the tank this summer and learn all about your favorite invertebrates and make some new favorites!

Portsmouth Touch Tank Opening Soon!

We're getting ready to open the touch tank in Portsmouth  for the summer! We've been stocking the tank with a variety of exciting critters (see photos on our Facebook page here) and have been working with the staff at the Isles of Shoals Steamship Company to bring the critters aboard their educational field trips with local school groups.

We are still finalizing our opening time and hours for the season, but right now, it looks like we'll be open on the weekend of June 18, and are planning our Grand Opening the weekend of June 25. After that, we'll be open Wednesday through Sunday until Labor Day weekend. Hours and daily activities will be posted here soon.  We also encourage you to "Like" the touch tank page or Blue Ocean Society page on Facebook for the latest updates.

We look forward to seeing you this summer!