Baltimore National Aquarium
My Story
The Aquarium
On July 21st, I went to the Baltimore National Aquarium for the first time. I have not been to an aquarium in over 12 years, so this was extremely exciting.
The photos seen here were taken by me and my dad.
-The Baltimowre National Aquarium opened to the public on August 8, 1981, spearheaded by Baltimore Mayor William Donald Schaefer in the 1970s to help redevelop Baltimore’s Inner Harbor
The Baltimore National Aquarium is the only national aquarium in America, meaning the United States Congress deemed it significant enough to be considered a national aquarium. It is Maryland’s largest paid tourist attraction, and is generally regarded as one of the best aquariums in the United States
Table of Contents
Introduction
What The Aquarium Is Like
-They have over 17,000 animals, including sharks, stingrays, sea nettles, catfish, and interestingly, some snakes, birds, and reptiles
-Their focus is conservation and rescue, as well as educating people about endangered species and conservation efforts for aquatic creatures
My Experience
My Favourite Animals
What It Inspired Me To Make
Conclusion
I absolutely loved this aquarium. It was so well kept and the architecture of the buildings was so pretty. My family and I spent about 4-5 hours there.
The outside area is also very pretty. You can see on the left of this photo they have a cool sign advertising the aquarium. It is very nice to look at, especially the wave design on one of the buildings as seen in the picture on the left. Overall all the buildings are very nice and welcoming, and it is a very nice touch that an aquarium full of aquatic animals is right on a river.
This is the route we took through the aquarium. The red line is where we entered and went first, the green line is where we went second, the blue line is where we went third, and the yellow line is where we went last.
I absolutely loved that you could go wherever you want. You’ll notice with the blue line that at one point we circled back to the bottom right area because we were not restricted in where we were allowed to go.
While most people are reasonable and save the gift shop for last, after entering the aquarium, I immediately booked it to the gift shop. There I found this massive stingray, which I absolutely needed to have. Unfortunately, since I know I have impulse buying problems and it was $200, I had to wait and decide if I really wanted to get it.
However, I did find this adorable whale that I purchased immediately and then carried around the aquarium the whole day.
After the gift shop, we went to the blacktip reef, where we saw sharks, stingrays, and assorted fishes. Seen below is a zebra shark and a reticulated whiptail ray. Seen above is a roughtail stingray.
Upstairs, there was a touch pool. There were horseshoe crabs and small cute stingrays. Unfortunately, a small child scared the two stingrays away from the touch area, so I could not pet the stingrays, which was honestly massively disappointing. The horshoe crabs were quite cool though. They kept forming little lines and laying on top of each other.
One of my favourite animals that I saw at the aquarium was the catfish. Catfish are one of my favourite animals in general, mostly because they look really stupid which is adorable and endearing to me.
The dolphins were my least favorite part of the aquarium. I feel very strongly about the treatment of whales in aquariums, because living their entire lives in small, concrete pools and being forced to perform is extremely cruel and upsetting. This is no different for dolphins. I feel it is very unethical for the aquarium to have this exhibit. The dolphins should be in a sanctuary where they have much more room to roam.
Dolphins
For every other animal in the aquarium, they have much more room proportionate to their size, and, most importantly, their tanks are suited for their natural habitat. This means plants and the seafloor are replicated as it would be in their natural habitat; whales and dolphins do not get this courtesy. They are put in simple concrete pools for their whole lives with no hints of their natural habitat.
Dolphins and whales are highly intelligent, another distinction from the other animals in the aquarium. They are smart enough to perform and recently have been known to be able to communicate with humans. These beautiful, intelligent animals deserve so much better than living in an aquarium.
Around the time we got to the Australian exhibit, I had decided to buy the big stingray. I once again booked it downstairs from the Australian exhibit and bought the big stingray.
The employees said that apparently it is very rare that anyone buys the big plush, and that they often rotate which one is there. They have had a big shark, a big turtle, and a big stingray. Since I love stingrays the most, I was very lucky that the stingray was the one that was there. I do not regret buying him at all and I miss him very much (He is home in America).
I also bought a really small cownose stingray, but I did not get a picture and he is in America unfortunately.
What It Inspired Me To Make
This is a pen drawing I did of a grouper fish and a catfish. I thought it came out really well. I love catfish, and the grouper fish just looked so silly, I had to draw him. I like the fish that look quite silly and dumb, and you will see that throughout the art I have created.
Below is art from the Australian exhibit. These are long necked turtles, which I also thought looked really funny, so I drew them using markers and pens.
Jelly Exhibit
All the art in these pages are from the jelly exhibit. I really liked the jellyfish, especially since most of them were glowing blue. The auarium inspired me to try something new: drawing on an iPad. I thought that getting an iPad would help me creatively, especially because I have not really used screen tablets for drawing. It went quite well I think. I was able to experiment with textures and learning Procreate, which is generally thought to be one of the best digital art programs.
These are jellywish I made with clay and then inserted pipe cleaners into to make them look like tentacles.
These are two more clay figures I made. The first one is of a leopard shark, and the second is a cownose stingray.
My Favourite Animal
My absolute favourite animal I found at the Baltimore Aquarium is the White Blotched River Stingray (Also known as the Xingu River Ray). They are very cute black stingrays with lots of white spots all over their body. I think they are adorable.
As opposed to stinging, the White Blotched River Stingray has a venomous tailtip, injecting venom into its prey. It is mildly venomous to humans.
The White Blotched River Stingray’s offspring are called “pups” that comprise their litters. While other stingray species typically have 4 pups to a litter, the white-blotched river stingray has 7-12 per litter. The aquarium hand feeds these little guys and gives them multivitamins. They have been trained to come when called to collect these multivitamins and their food, showcasing their intelligence.
I had not heard of the White Blotched River Stingray before coming to the aquarium, and I instantly fell in love. This stingray inspired a lot of the art I have done for this project and basically became the whole focus of the art I was making.
One such case resulted from the fact that the aquarium did not have a plush of this stingray, so I made my own. I am very proud of it and I think it is absolutely adorable and has become one of my favourite plushies I own.
I also made a 3D model of the stingray at uni during a blender class. I tried to give it the same white spot patterns as the one at the Baltimore Aquarium, since that one is especially pretty.
I also used an intro template in Premiere Pro during a Digital Media workshop and coloured it to mimic the colours of the stingray and added its name in the text. The rest of the project was unrelated but I thought it looked cool.
I made a clay model of the stingray as well. I also think this one came out super cute, especially since it was one of my first times trying to sculpt something with clay.
I feel like going to the aquarium really inspired me to try making things that I hadn’t really made before, like a 3D model, a plush, and a clay model. It was a really cool experience, and I enjoyed it immensely.
You can see on all the art pieces I did of the White Blotched River Stingray, I tried to mimic the patterns on the Baltimore stingray, especially the one spot on its left side that is a white ring with a white spot in the middle.
Overall, the aquarium was very inspiring, and I’m very proud of what it inspired me to create. I think aquariums are wonderful places, and I am so glad I got to experience it and use it to create art of my favourite animals.