Port of Friday Harbor Marina

The Spring Street Aquarium at Friday Harbor
By Mike Kaill, Aquarium Manager for the Port of Friday Harbor

At the foot of Spring Street, next to the ferry terminal, is a passenger terminal.

Within the waiting room of that terminal is a 400 gallon marine aquarium, devoted to appreciation of our local community of marine animals. The water for the aquarium takes water directly from the harbor. The water flows through the tank, then out by way of a stand-pipe. This way, the small plants and animals in the water, are available for those that eat them, the so called filter-feeders.

Within the aquarium, there are animals that are to be found literally under your feet.

As you walk the docks, look down the sides of the floats. Fascinating animals live there, and are in the aquarium for a better, safer, and more comfortable look.

Careful observation will reveal other fishes, including the some times quite aggressive gunnel, an eel-like fish, a tadpole looking fish called a cling fish, as well as others, as we come across them.

But in many ways, the invertebrates (without backbone animals) are more interesting. First, because you probably have not seen them before, and secondly, because they have so many fantastic features and behaviors. For example, the small orange sea cucumber is a filter feeder.

It takes small plants and animals out of the water by tangling the prey in its five, finely branched arms. Look for this guy peeking out from under the large “window” rock. All you will probably see is the feeding structures, but look at those arms. Soon, you will see one of them slowly curved toward the mouth, then it will go into the mouth, and be “licked” off, in the way a child will lick off a spoon with cookie dough.

Orange Sea Cucumber-Feeding

Photo by Michael Kaill 2007
(click to enlarge)

The other cucumber is much larger, (it is taken commercially from our waters, and shipped overseas as a delicacy). This animal is not as prickly as it looks. It is quite soft, and uses equally complicated, but different, mouth parts, to clean the bottom of organic debris.

Another interesting filter feeder is the tube worm , coming out of the glass bowl next to the window rock. It is a true worm, distantly related to the earth worm, living in that tube and extending that complex feather duster to capture small creatures in the water.

Here and there in the aquarium can be seen scallops, sold locally (and in restaurants) as “singing scallops.” These creatures have eyes, bright blue and good enough to see their enemy the sea star. At which time they are able to swim away, by jetting water from between their shells.

There is a type of snail in the aquarium that has an interesting story. It has no shell, and makes a point of being obvious (as well as beautiful). There are several species, but all make a point of eating animals with defenses (such as the stinging cells of jellyfish) and then capturing the defensive structures and using them for their own defense. So the obviousness of these snails, called nudibranchs (for naked gill) is a form of warning coloration, in the way that a bee warns us by being yellow and black. Look for wavy, flowery, or fuzzy structures on the back of an impressively pretty slug.