Houston Downtown Aquarium - Not Impressed

[wesreyn]

With my new business, I am in Houston quite a bit. I stayed downtown last week and decided to go to the Houston Downtown Aquarium. I was very disappointed and quite honestly disturbed by what I saw. The saltwater fish in their reef tank looked very bad. A BUNCH of sick fish and so many with missing fins. Their tanks were full of fish WAYYYY too big for the tanks they were in. They had the biggest groupers I have ever seen all in a tank together with not much room to move around. I believe their fish have outgrown their tanks and they arent doing anything about it. Has anyone else been there recently to see this? Also, it is kinda weird because their anemone tank has some of the biggest nems I have ever seen but there is absolutely no flow in the tank and seems like pretty dull lighting.

[victoly]

It's more of a restaurant/tourist trap than an ecological exhibit IMO. The texas state aquarium in corpus, the dallas aquarium and seaworld are the best IMO (in that order).

[Juiceman]

Yeah, the focus of the Houston "aquarium" is the restaurant. Not the fish. That's just for aesthetics.

[FarmerTy]

Its a restaurant concept owned by the guy that runs Landrys and Joes Crabshack. Another one of his theme restaurants is the rainforest cafe... same concept... theme of the "aquarium" restaurant versus actually being a city aquarium.

[+Mitch]

yeah, it's definitely a restaurant, and not a aquarium. too bad their husbandry is lacking.

[+Grog]

If you are in Houston a lot, a drive to Galveston may be worth it. I enjoy Moody Gardens there and like the variety they have.

[Bpb]

Moody gardens is definitely better than the Houston aquarium. However, this summer, every one of their reef tanks was dominated with aiptasia. Hundreds of thousands. Some of them several inches in size. Really nice looking stuff otherwise. I really like that they have windows into all of their maintenance rooms and such too

[esacjack]

went to the houston aquarium for my fiances birthday dinner. The food was ok, the aquarium was 'ok' as well. I wasn't fond of all the plastic coral. We did really enjoy that massive column of water through the building though. We also did find it a little strange eating seafood with fish watching us....

[Timfish]

. . . Also, it is kinda weird because their anemone tank has some of the biggest nems I have ever seen but there is absolutely no flow in the tank and seems like pretty dull lighting.

Sad to hear about fish being crowded nad/or not getting adequite maintainance. If the tangs were missing thier dorsal fins sounds like a bad case of HLLE. I'm not surprised about the anemonies though, they don't need as much light as some people say and Delbeek and Sprung reccomend pumpless systems for keeping anemonies in Vol II of their "Reef Aquarium" series.