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A bumble bee (Bombus sp.) collects pollen from purpletop vervain (Verbena bonariensis) in a pollinator plot on the Tennessee Aquarium plaza in Chattanooga.  Tennessee Aquarium

Aquarium celebrates Pollinator Week with activities and giveaways June 17-23

Doug Strickland is a writer for the Tennessee Aquarium.

CHATTANOOGA — Pollinators. They’re kind of a big deal.

From iconic monarch butterflies and humble honey bees to fast-flying hummingbirds and acrobatic ... lemurs?! ... the animals that help plants reproduce are collectively known as “pollinators.” Whether intentional or accidental, the actions of pollen-transporting species contribute tremendously to the health of their respective ecosystems and are responsible for a shocking amount of the food we eat.

The benefits of the human-pollinator relationship are a two-way street. According to the Pollinator Partnership, a nonprofit dedicated to raising awareness about the role pollinators play, pollinators are responsible for roughly one of every three bites of food we eat and propagate over 180,000 different plant species — including more than 1,200 food crops.

This juvenile lake sturgeon was one of 50 released into the Tennessee River from Chattanooga’s Coolidge Park on May 2. The lineage of the fish can be traced millions of years, but overfishing, dams and habitat destruction has led to widespread population declines throughout its natural range.  Doug Strickland/Tennessee Aquarium

Lake sturgeon recovery links rivers and experts in Tennessee and Wisconsin 

Doug Strickland is a writer for the Tennessee Aquarium in Chattanooga.

CHATTANOOGA — Just across from the iconic peaks of the Tennessee Aquarium on the shore of the Tennessee River, a group of scientists with the Tennessee Aquarium Conservation Institute gathered on an early May morning to restore a primordial fish to the state’s primary waterway.

One by one, they carefully navigated down a boat ramp at Coolidge Park before gently releasing juvenile lake sturgeon, each just under a foot in length, into the river’s shallows.

These 50 sturgeon were the final youngsters to be reintroduced from a class of hundreds of sturgeon fry that arrived at the Conservation Institute’s freshwater field station last summer. Their introduction to the Tennessee River represented the latest milestone of a decades-long conservation effort to restore this state-endangered fish.

Despite reclaiming their one-time home in the waters of the Volunteer State, these newfound Tennesseans began life some 850 miles north of Chattanooga.

Gentoo penguin Carla selects a rock for her nest during “Rock Day,” which begins penguin nesting season at the Tennessee Aquarium.  Photo courtesy Tennessee Aquarium

Penguins swing into spring nesting season — with lots of rocks

Doug Strickland is a communications specialist at the Tennessee Aquarium.

CHATTANOOGA — While other birds’ hearts might flutter at the thought of building nests with supple twigs, fluffy fibers, mud or even their own saliva (yes, really), nothing gets the Tennessee Aquarium’s penguins quite as excited as rocks.

Big rocks. Little rocks. Smooth rocks. Rough rocks. Whatever type of rock a bird prefers, their arrival by the bucketful in the Penguins’ Rock gallery signals the official start of penguin nesting season and a flurry of activity that may — flippers crossed — lead to one or more tiny, fluffy chicks this summer. The birds typically begin nesting around April 1.

“These guys have been ready for a couple of weeks as the lights are gradually changing, and the days are getting a little bit longer, so they’ve known that this was coming,” says Assistant Curator Loribeth Lee.

Those steadily lengthening days, courtesy of the Aquarium’s team of systems operators, herald the arrival of spring and trigger biological signals telling the penguins that love is in the air. Nevertheless, it isn’t until the rocks are dumped into inviting piles& that the Gentoo and Macaroni Penguins can get to work building the nests that will help protect their young.

Polar bears on Wrangel Island, Russia. As the sea ice melts each summer, more than 1,000 bears come to Wrangel to wait for the return of the sea ice. It's the largest concentration of polar bears on Earth. BBC Studios via Tennessee Aquarium

Learn how the Arctic still thrives in the face of existential climate threats in new IMAX film

Doug Strickland is a writer for the Tennessee Aquarium.

CHATTANOOGA — At first glance, the Arctic seems an impossibly inhospitable place, a frigid wasteland of extremes in which nothing can survive.

Only one-quarter of this vast polar region at the top of the world is made up of land. The rest is comprised of a glacially cold ocean capped by vast stretches of ice. 

Despite its harsh conditions, life has found a way to endure — and even thrive — in the Arctic. Audiences will meet just a few of the Arctic’s charismatic residents on Jan. 11, 2024 when the Tennessee Aquarium IMAX 3D Theater debuts a new giant-screen film, Arctic 3D: Our Frozen Planet. 

An American alligator (Alligator mississippiensis) paints art for the fall fundraising auction for the Tennessee Aquarium. The auction runs through Sept. 26.  Tennessee Aquarium

Wildlife masterpieces mark an artistic autumnal fundraiser for the Tennessee Aquarium

CHATTANOOGA — While getting ready to tackle his next artistic masterpiece at the Tennessee Aquarium, Avior the red-ruffed lemur likes to take a few steps to center himself: languid naps in the sunshine, delicate nibbles of romaine lettuce, a resounding howl to focus his energy. 

Only after these rituals are complete can this master of composition — a true “Lemur-nardo” da Vinci — begin putting paw and tail to canvas to create his next opus. 

Avior’s latest triumph — made using non-toxic, animal-friendly tempura paint, naturally — is a 16-by-20-inch piece created in collaboration with his fellow lemurs and social media star Atlanta-based artist Andrea Nelson (TikTok video). Avior and Nelson’s masterwork is one of more than two dozen pieces of art made by aquarium animals now up for bid during the Tennessee Aquarium’s online fall fundraising auction. The auction will conclude at noon on Monday, Sept. 26.

Tennessee Aquarium

Tennessee Aquarium hatches endangered shark species

CHATTANOOGA — The Tennessee Aquarium reached a significant milestone just in time for Shark Week with the recent hatching of three critically endangered short-tail nurse shark pups. 

The diminutive youngsters, which hatched July 7, are the product of three adult short-tail nurse sharks — one male and two females — which arrived at the aquarium along with eight juveniles and eight fertilized eggs from a facility in Canada last year.