New Jellyfish Exhibit Is the Toast of the Aquarium

The soothing, lava lamp-like motions of jellyfish are making the creatures popular additions to marine exhibits nationwide.

But to children visiting the new jellyfish exhibit Friday at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, they were just plain weird-looking.

“They look like pumpkins,” said 5-year-old Karolyn Powell of Riverside. “Scary pumpkins.”

“They probably feel like jelly,” said 8-year-old Evan Casaus of Montrose.

“They look like bubbles and stuff,” said Justin Hudson, 10, of Tucson. “I would like to have one as a pet.”

Familiarizing people with the odd-looking creatures is exactly why the aquarium opened the exhibit, said Perry Hampton, who is in charge of animal collections at the facility.

“We knew that this was a proven winner,” he said. “Displays of this type have been very popular at a number of major aquariums across the country, most notably in New England, Baltimore, Tennessee and others.

“Most people’s contact with them is having them brush up against their leg or seeing them washed up on the beach, and they do not look very appealing in that environment,” he said. “In their natural setting, they are very mesmerizing, beautiful creatures.”

Part of the attraction to jellyfish is their strange look, said Chuck Kopczak, curator of ecology programs at the California Science Center in Los Angeles’ Exposition Park.

“They have no eyes and no brains; they have nothing [usually] associated with a living animal,” he said. “It’s that calming, very relaxing aspect of a jellyfish that has made them so popular.”

Kopczak said the science center’s jellyfish exhibit is a huge hit and makes an ideal display for public viewing.

“There are all different,” he said. “They come in so many colors and so many sizes and they are just so bizarre.”

The Long Beach exhibit houses 13 species, including six from local waters. Among them are the Beroe, with its neon-like hair, and the lion’s mane, whose sting feels like a first-degree burn, Senior Aquarist Matt Ankley said.

Tucson resident Mike McCall, vacationing with his family, heard about the exhibit Thursday night.

He and his wife enjoyed a similar exhibit in Baltimore and wanted their 4-year-old son, Christopher, to get his chance to see one.

“This is something you don’t see in the desert,” McCall said.