Horniman Museum Aquarium

When our Auntie and Uncle came over from Scotland we decided we wanted to go to the Horniman Museum again.  They had a fantastic aquarium which we didn't get to see the last time we went there so I was really excited.

The first thing we saw in the aquarium was a huge starfish clinging on with it's suckers to it's glass tank.

My brother really wanted to see the starfish too but he was just a bit short!

 Here's a picture of the seahorse that we saw using it's tail as a hook to cling on to the seagrass.  We learnt some fun facts about seahorses...

• Seahorses eat small microscopic krill floating through the water.  They suck them in through their long, straw-like snout.
• With seahorses it's the male who becomes pregnant and gives birth to the babies.  They are usually pregnant for between 10 days and 6 weeks.
• Their name comes from the Greek words for horse (hippos) and sea monster (campus).

This is a really cool kind of ray called a blue spotted sting ray.  

 This is pacific sea nettle.  They had about 2 of them at the aquarium.  I thought they were really cool just drifting along in big circle shapes and never changing pace or suddenly changing direction.  They hunt by dragging their long stinging tentacles behind them, catching small krill and sea dwelling creatures.  They stun them with their painful sting.  If they were to sting a human though it might be irritating but the poison is very rarely deadly.

Amazon Rainforest Frogs

These are amazon milk frogs.  They aren't poisonous like some of the rainforest dwelling frogs that live there but I still though these guys were pretty cool.  If they're attacked they secrete a milky liquid out of bumps on their bodies. 

This is a blue poison frog hiding in a burrow.  Though the one we saw was only as poisonous as the milk frog (not poisonous at all) because it's not the blue poison frogs own body that makes it poisonous but it's the ants it eats in it's natural habitat.  So, when they are bred in captivity like the frog in this aquarium they aren't poisonous at all! 

 We were also lucky enough to see these amazing fish eggs.  Look how they are cleverly attached to the coral.