Florida's Smaller Marine Attractions

By Samantha Crespo
Published: October 20, 2007
Last Updated On: December 2, 2011

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Florida's smaller marine attractions and aquariums are educational, family-friendly and less crowded than big city attractions.

Everything's bigger these days. Children widen their eyes at large-screen TVs, "drive" toy Hummers and bounce inside steroid-injected Moon Walks. Family attractions now are similarly grand. And big's not a bad way to go.

Swim with the dolphins at Panama City Beach's Gulf World Marine Park, Orlando's Discovery Cove, Key Largo's Dolphin World or Islamorada's Theater of the Sea (the latter lets you splash with sea lions and rays, too); submerging oneself in a shark cage at Orlando's SeaWorld or Tampa's Florida Aquarium - plenty of kids (and parents too) crave major underwater interaction, and the learning that ensues proves a similarly sizable bonus.

That doesn't change when you fill the family outing with small wonders. For your crew, maybe that means discovering a pocket-sized aquarium (relatively speaking). Or seeking out the sea's tinier beings. Perhaps it's visiting a lab or conservation center that's not quite as slick as the state's whopper attractions, but just as full of fun and learning (plus a heck of a lot drier). Here are a few personal favorites:

It's easy for my family to love the Pier Aquarium in downtown St. Petersburg. It is my hometown aquarium. But what makes this a find for families is the way it blends right into the St. Petersburg Pier, a Crayola-colored collection of shops and restaurants and a launching point for charter boat and bicycling excursions. The aquarium experience begins on your approach into the Pier. Along this promenade (called the WaterWalk), a scallop named Skippy introduces you to some of the 200-plus species that live in surrounding Tampa Bay.

Inside the Pier, the classic fish bowl gets made over as a series of floor-to-ceiling cylindrical tanks. Reminiscent of those clear, plastic tubes filled with water and glitter (doused in growth tonic), the tanks provide a chance to meet some of the species Skippy told you about, including such Tampa Bay natives as killifish and puffers. Though our nieces and nephews know what awaits on the second floor, it's always a challenge to unglue them from the cylinders.

With a microscopic admission, you'll have plenty of spending money to rent a surrey for a family bike ride, grab a bite at one of the Pier's many restaurants or take something home from one of its souvenir shops.

Even on its intimate scale, the Pier encourages interactivity. That's where the second floor comes in. Help feed the Coral Catsharks at 3 p.m. (the aquarium has a shark conservation program for these small sharks from the Indo-Pacific and are raising these small sharks from laid egg cases). You’ll receive an official "shark feeder" certificate for your labor. Other exhibits for exploration include an Atlantic Ocean tank, a fluorescent coral reef tank, a Florida sportfish tank and green moray eel and lobster tank. Species names like "lionfish" and "clownfish" make it easy for even the youngest ones to remember their discoveries.

The first Saturday of every month is particularly eventful, when Book Nook by the Bay presents a family literary program that features a book from The Pier Aquarium’s library, a craft activity related to the book, special guests (possibly including traveling author readers) and story time. With just about 2,000 square feet of aquarium space to explore, it's a good idea to catch a program or feeding, check out the tanks and spend the rest of the day enjoying the Pier. With a microscopic admission, you'll have plenty of spending money to rent a surrey for a family bike ride, grab a bite at one of the Pier's many restaurants or take something home from one of its souvenir shops.

However, those looking to visit the pier location should travel soon, as The Pier Aquarium recently announced a move and a new facility at John’s Pass Village in Madeira Beach in 2012. Secrets of the Sea Marine Exploration Center and Aquarium will showcase research and innovation by the St. Petersburg Ocean Team, one of the largest concentrations of marine scientists and engineers in the southeastern United States. The opening date is Dec. 12, 2012. Updates will be posted on Facebook, Secrets of the Sea, and at www.thesecretsofthesea.org.

You won't see a commercial for the Gulf Specimen Marine Laboratory, or GSML, during your child's Saturday morning cartoon line-up. A wooden sign flanked by a seahorse better reflects this attraction's charm. Located in Panacea, a town about 30 miles south of Tallahassee near the Gulf of Mexico, it sits on a quiet street with one purpose - to highlight the treasures of the north Florida coast.

Ironically, it takes no meager amount of water to accomplish this. In 30,000 gallons of seawater (divided among several touch tanks and aquariums), sea horses, sponges, starfish, sea cucumbers and crabs swim and bury themselves in the sand. There are larger species, too - octopi, sharks, rays, moray eels. At times, you may even see a sea turtle the lab has taken in for rehabilitation. Ask a staff member about GSML's sea turtle research and conservation program. As the third oldest such program in the U.S. (begun in 1964), and recipient of the EPA's Gulf Guardian Award for Youth Education (2003), GSML positions the family smack dab in the middle of a lesson on conservation.

Of course, as all parents know, that which is off-limits drums the most curiosity. And so it is with GSML's concrete, no-touch tanks. It doesn't sound wise to grab something called a spiny boxfish anyway, but it sure can be interesting to look at, along with scads of patterned triggerfish and ominous black sea bass.

Another element of intrigue surrounding GSML is that it's never the same place twice. The 100 to 200 species you'll find here at any given time are delivered by the staff and local shrimpers, crabbers and fishermen. Tanks re-create the tidal, limestone and sandy conditions the species are accustomed to, reminding visitors that GSML stands for the protection of sea creatures and their environments. Ask a staff member about that one, or read up on the lab's ecology displays, and watch your budding biologist beam.

If conservation catches your kid's attention, make the trip to Loggerhead Marinelife Center in Juno Beach. Tanks and displays feature live and preserved specimens, but this is a bona fide sea turtle hospital where as many as 50-60 turtles check in annually for rehabilitation and release. Shots, physical therapy and even surgery are prescribed and carried out here. (This fact was of particular interest to my niece, Kalista, who cites "veterinarian" as a chief career ambition - just above "pop star.")

It's still the place to learn about some of the sea's teensiest creatures. At least they start out that way. The thousands of hatchlings that the center cares for and releases each year average just two to three inches in length and weigh about an ounce. Mature leatherbacks, the largest of the sea turtles, can weigh 700 to 1,500 pounds and measure four to eight feet long. And you thought staying on top of your child's growth spurts was maddening.