Fall hours and opportunities

Thanks to everyone for a great summer! We at Blue Ocean Society have had a wonderful time getting to know you and helping you get to know local marine wildlife.

With the summer wrapping up and school back in session, we will be changing our open hours for the month of September. The tank is scheduled to be open on Saturdays and Sundays from noon to 2 p.m. If you would like to visit during the week, please call the Blue Ocean Society office at (603) 431-0260, and we can schedule a time to be there for you.

Local educators: Bring your students to the touch tank! If you'd like to schedule a mini field-trip, call the Blue Ocean Society office at (603) 431-0260 or e-mail katherine@blueoceansociety.org. We offer presentations, games and activities that give kids a hands-on learning experience. And the best part is, it's free! Call or e-mail today!

Thank you!

Special thanks go to Russ Northrop, a local scuba diver and friend of the tank who has gone out of his way several times to collect some beautiful critters for us. Thanks also to Atlantic Aquasport in Rye, with whom Russ dives on Saturday mornings - the business has been very supportive in our search for animals for the tank. Thank you to Wayne, a diver who works for the Isles of Shoals Steamship Co. He brought us some great examples of colonial tunicates, which are highly invasive and coating the bottom of the Piscataqua in amounts Wayne said he's never seen in his 30 years of diving. Thanks to Tom, a crewman on the M/V Thomas Laighton who has brought us some fascinating animals found in his lobster traps. And thank you to Seaport Fish, who has kindly donated food for our critters.

Great Surprise!

Saturday morning was a slow start at the touch tank because of the rain clouds overhead. However, the Jeffrey's Ledge came along and it is looking fantastic, and by early afternoon the sun was coming through and the touch tank was booming. The best part was getting a donation of some wonderful brand new additions. The touch now has Blood Stars, Northern Sea Stars, Jonah crabs, and 2 baby hermit crabs. Come down and take a look.

Feeding Frenzy!

Here are some videos from one of our recent feedings at the touch tank!  We feed the fish and crabs every Tuesday and Friday around 1pm, so if you are interested come on down and let us know you want to see the feeding session!

And some big news - we got some new additions to the touch tank today!  We now have a lot more Northern sea stars, some blood stars, hermit crabs, and both adult and baby Jonah crabs!  So come see them!

And don't forget to take a picture with our sea stars when you visit!

A reminder about our hours:

Mon-Thu 10am-2pm

Fri-Sun 9am-2pm

See you at the touch tank! 

PS - don't forget to take a picture with our sea stars when you visit!

Happenings at the Touch Tank Mon. July 28th

So today was a fun day filled with a steady amount of visitors curious to see what was in our touch tank. Some of these visitors were passengers who had heard about the touch tank after being a passenger aboard one of our whale watches and others were people who had seen our sign and decided to stop by. Many of our visitors often have interesting questions about the critters in the tank and one question we were asked today was, do crabs hibernate? Other happens at the touch tank is our on going project to make a model of Jeffrey's Ledge. Right now the construction is underway and hopefully soon visitors can start to see the construction in progress.

Touch Tank Fixed

Saturday, Saturday July 26

It was a lovely and not rainy morning on the Isles of Shoals Dock. We were ready to get the touch tank going and then Cassie says" the touch tank is not on." Well, that began an hour in a half of trying to figure out why it wouldn't turn on, because everything was turned on and yet the touch tank was not. We called tech support that is only open from 9-5 Monday through Friday (because apparently that is the only time touch tanks break), and got lucky because the plant supervisor was there to answer. We ran through a few scenarios and found that the problem was with the extension cord. The rain storms in the past week were pretty severe and had shorted out tripping the reset button on the outlet, which is fantastic or we could have caused a fire because there was exposed wire. Reset buttons are awesome. We bought a new extension cord and everything was wonderful. We a good number of people show for the touch tank and besides the morning hiccup everything turned out fantastic. Always check your extension cords for exposed wires, especially old ones. The tank was saved and smiling faces were had by all!
By Rachel Neild, Blue Ocean Society educator

Inclement weather

We've closed the tank today due to stormy weather. Come visit us this weekend instead!