My colleagues Dr. Bruce Carlson – recently retired – and Marj Awai were the first folks to successfully collect chambered nautilus for display in public aquariums and then breed them. Bruce has now put together a short video documenting that project over its nearly 20 year history. As I watched it, I couldnt help but marvel at their ingenuity and persistence in cracking this difficult (and SLOW!) life cycle. Baby nautilus are pretty high on the Squee!-o-meter too…
Now that Bruce is back in Hawaii, where he was curator of the Waikiki Aquarium for many years, I look forward to his uploading other gems from a stellar career in aquarium biology and ichthyology. It promises to be good, because over that time he and Marj also became accomplished underwater photographers and videographers.
So, that’s what a nautilus looks like!