The open ocean - A Fascination for Fish: Adventures of an Underwater Pioneer - page 262

covery of the previously unknown life cycle of the West Coast Pelagia
may eventually result in this jelly's being reclassified and placed in a
di¤erent genus.
Next, Freya worked with the sea nettle ( Chrysaora fuscescens ), which
at times occurs in huge swarms o¤ the West Coast. Again she was suc-
cessful in getting them to reproduce and produce polyps and then young
medusas.
With all Freya's successes, we were running out of tanks and space.
We designed and had larger kreisel tanks made to give her multiply-
ing jellies room to grow.
Although the lives of planktonic creatures had been widely studied
by a number of people in the academic world, few researchers had suc-
ceeded in keeping these animals alive for any length of time. Some of
these scientists—most notably Claudia Mills of the University of Wash-
ington, Sid Tamm of Woods Hole Oceanographic Laboratory, and Ron
Larson of Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute in Florida—were
excited about the work we were tackling and enthusiastically shared
their knowledge with Freya. Their encouragement and support were
of great help.
“PLANET OF THE JELLIES”
Freya Sommer's research results with jellies were first demonstrated in
a special exhibit, “Living Treasures of the Pacific,” which focused on
the beauty of marine animals and plants: on their colors, shape, or mo-
tion as a form of living art. This exhibit, which opened in 1989 and
ran for a year and a half, was then followed by “Sharks: They Are Not
What You Think”—a topic we knew would be popular and easy to
market. As we had anticipated, the exhibit was a success. Visitors learned
about the diversity of sharks and that 95 percent of them are quite harm-
less, not at all like “Jaws.”
Deciding on the topic for the next special exhibit wasn't as easy. Based
on the progress we'd made in the culture of jellies, however, as well as
visitors' reactions to the three “Living Treasures” jelly tanks, I pushed
hard for an entire show on jellies. I knew full well it would be a hit.
In my experience, stimulation of the two sides of human experience—