Winter in August - a Visit to the Clearwater Marine Aquarium

On Saturday I spent the morning at the Clearwater Marine Aquarium, home of Winter the dolphin. The movie Dolphin Tale is based on Winter’s real life story – a baby dolphin entangled in crab trap rope loses her tail and inspires a team of experts to design the very first prosthetic dolphin tail. My last visit to the aquarium was in 2011 before the movie premiered, so I was interested in what had changed since then.

As it turned out, there were quite a lot of new things to see. Just a few months ago, the aquarium opened the R.O. Jacobson Center, which houses a new surgical suite, additional pools for injured sea turtles and even an area for the scuba divers who clean the tanks to store their gear. I got to see a lot of these updates first-hand during a Behind the Scenes tour. The new food preparation area is a huge improvement over the tiny room where Sawyer and Hazel made “fish milkshakes” in the film. I also got to see the new state-of-the-art water filtration system (which looked like our pool filtration system times 1000).

Behind the Scenes Tour

turtle hospital

Also new were several movie displays and props, including the houseboat where Harry Connick Jr.’s character lived. Although the aquarium doesn’t receive any royalties from Dolphin Tale, it has definitely capitalized on the movie’s success. According to a recent article in the Tampa Bay Times, attendance shot up from 200,000 in 2011 to 750,000 in 2012.

While it’s understandable that people come to see Winter, the aquarium has lots of other residents – sea turtles, otters, rays and of course, other dolphins. There is baby Hope, rescued exactly 5 years and one day after Winter was found. And Panama, the aquarium’s oldest dolphin, who acts as a mother figure to both Winter and Hope. One of the volunteers told me that she loves to watch these three interacting, with Panama separating the youngsters when they get too rowdy.

Panama and Winter

a replica of Winter's prosthetic tail

Dolphin Tale houseboat

My favorite part of the visit was watching the Dolphin Presentation with Nicholas. Nicholas got his name because he was found stranded on the beach with his mother Noelle on Christmas Eve 2002. Unfortunately, Noelle died a few days later, leaving 6-month-old Nicholas too young to survive on his own. (You can read Nicholas’s story here: http://www.seewinter.com/nicholas) Nicholas recovered from his injuries (although he still has sunburn scars on his back), and has turned into an energetic teenage boy. His show was a lot of fun - and also very wet. The trainers did warn everyone that the first three rows of seats were the “Splash Zone”.  I sat in the 4th row and got splashed anyway. But I saved my camera! :-)  After the show, I lingered around and got to see Nicholas interacting with the two trainers. He waited for their attention, then they started talking to him and giving him belly rubs and kisses.  It was really touching to see so much love and affection between human and dolphin.

Nicholas

Although the Clearwater Marine Aquarium is the permanent home to many marine animals, its mission is “rescue, rehabilitation and release”. On Sunday, Ron and I were out on the boat and saw wild dolphins fishing and playing in the Intracoastal Waterway - exactly where they belong.