In the very beginning, early on in the ’70s, they had large elephant seals, really large elephant seals. And, again, we found with the large elephant seals is that, when they molt, they stop eating. And it’s a very tough time in their life because they’re now on the beaches… Read More
Any stories?… Read More
Bubbles, she was there when I arrived. She was collected in the Catalina Channel early in the ’60s. She lived 50 plus years. She was always a neat animal and all was fun to work with. And she would just love squid. She loved squid. And it was just amazing… Read More
And they’re beautiful animals. And, of course, they cohabitated the Catalina Channel. So they were always swimming together out there. And it was great for people to sit there and watch these animals, and then turn and be able to see, actually, if the animals were close to offshore, they… Read More
Orky and Corky were two killer whales that were collected in the Pacific, up in the Pacific Northwest. They were collected, I believe, in ’67, ’69, somewhere in that timeframe. And, of course, they did the show at Marineland. And they were great animals. Our experiences with them were very… Read More
I think they do a lot of it by watching others, their aunties and others. And so I think a lot of it is learned behavior along with some of the instinctual issues too. You know, obviously, they start lactating and nursing starts happening and things like that, they have… Read More
And today I can tell you any dolphin or beluga whale or killer whale that’s born that is either premature or its mother has having problems or the baby’s having problems, we know how to raise one because we know how to do it. We know how to handle them. Read More
Speaking of whales, how did Bubbles, the pilot whale, come to Marineland, and did you work with her?… Read More
At Marineland, did you work with Orky and Corky?… Read More
(indistinct) stories about Orky and Corky?… Read More
And who were Orky and Corky?… Read More
At the time, were you in direct competition with Disneyland, and how did that affect the park visitors?… Read More
We were in competition with Disneyland. And then Universal Studios, of course, was built. And that was a different type of competition because they really didn’t have what we had at Marineland. But as I said, Marineland was somewhat isolated geographically and it was quite the drive. And then, of… Read More
Why do you think that is?… Read More
I think it has a great reputation simply because a lot of the founders in the aquarium community came from there. If you go back and look at all the people that started there, like the Jerry Goldsmiths and the Ken Norrises and Tom Ottens and the Brad Andrews and… Read More
Most of the educational work that we did was based upon schools sending busloads of kids. We’d set up guided tours in the early morning and took them through the park and explained to them all of the different animals and what they do. And then they would spend a… Read More
So we created a touch pool within the aquarium areas. But we didn’t have people grabbing them. We had them put in little plexiglass boxes so they could look at two feet and move along. And then we’d put it back in and let the starfish crawl out. And so… Read More
Was there research being conducted of any kind during this time?… Read More
There was quite a bit of research going on in terms of the reproduction of all of the different species and documentation of that. Bill Walker and Ken Norris and all of those individuals set up very nice projects, you know, different projects to study the different fishes. And there… Read More
It’s been duplicated in a lot of places. You can go across the street from here in SeaWorld Orlando to Discovery Cove and there’s a beautiful reef, a artificial reef that you can snorkel through. And, of course, there’s lots of those particular types of exhibit areas in Hawaii now,… Read More