A Day in the Life of Shedd’s Sea Otter Pup: Water Play!

“Are you ready for extreme cuteness?” animal care specialist Megan Vens-Policky asks as she invites me into the sea otter nursery for an hour and a half of watching Cayucos eat, train, play and, above all, be cute.

Marine Mammal Moms-to-be

The stork is going to have to call out the reinforcements: Shedd is expecting not one but two marine mammal calves, a Pacific white-sided dolphin in spring and a beluga whale due sometime in the fall.

We’re excited about these pending additions to the Shedd animal family. Beluga mom Mauyak (MY-ak) and dolphin mom Piquet (pee-KEHT) are healthy, and so far their pregnancies are progressing normally. And from our regular prenatal monitoring of the moms and the fetuses, we are already adding to what is known about two species that are not often seen in aquariums and are challenging to study in the ocean.

In memory of Otis

Sea lion Otis led a charmed life. Marked as one of a group of “nuisance” sea lions that repeatedly had to be removed from around the Bonneville Dam, his time was just about up when a creative reprieve brokered by wildlife officials and the zoo and aquarium community brought him to Shedd in 2009.

Yesterday, our animal health and care team made the difficult decision to euthanize the beloved 13-year-old California sea lion after a rapid decline in his health due to an aggressive form of cancer. The same disease occurs in wild populations of his species, and Shedd’s scientists hope that what we can learn from our loss will contribute to saving other sea lions, both in aquariums and in the wild.

A Day in the Life of Shedd’s Sea Otter Pup: Mealtime

Sea otter pup Cayucos’s day starts a lot like yours and mine: She wakes up, she might splash in a little water and groom, and she has breakfast.

But then it veers off into what we can only hope for when we’re on vacation: swimming, playing games, catching a few naps, hanging out with friends and indulging in good food. And—like we might also do on vacation—gaining weight. But when you’re a rapidly growing pup, that’s a good thing.

Sea nettle of a different stripe

Each species in Shedd’s Jellies special exhibit has some stunning attribute that sets it apart from the others and makes you stop and look. The purple-striped sea nettle is a study in contrasts. The silver-white bell has 16 deep red rays that will darken to purple as the jelly matures. Between the rays are fine speckles in a similar hue. From the inside center of the large bell, four ruffled white oral arms can trail a foot or more while eight maroon tentacles hang down like ribbons from the bell’s edge.

The stripes on the bell make it easier to picture the inner workings of jellies. Small planktonic prey are zapped by the stinging cells on the tentacles and then carried along the tentacles and oral arms into the jelly’s stomach. Digested nutrients course through the body in tubular canals associated with those colorful rays on the bell. What isn’t digested goes back out the way it came in, through the mouth.

Whale of a Love Story: Matt and Krystal

For the last several weeks, Shedd Aquarium and NBC Chicago collected the love stories of couples seeking to take the next step in their relationship. Through this contest, Matt won the chance to propose to Krystal at Shedd, with the help of a beluga whale! If you believe timing is everything, you will enjoy this story.

Matt and Krystal both attended Bradley University, but never met despite the school’s small size. They had mutual friends and at times lived down the street from each other, but their paths never crossed. It wasn’t time.

New Sea Otter Pup Gets Around-the-Clock Care

In Shedd’s sea otter nursery, animal care experts are working around the clock in two 12-hour shifts to attend to the needs of Shedd’s latest addition, a southern sea otter pup. Like parents of a newborn baby, they must keep to a rigorous schedule of feedings, cleanups, playtime and naps—plus swimming lessons and intensive grooming sessions to keep the pup’s thick fur clean, dry and insulating. In place of diapers, the marine mammal department’s washer and dryer keep spinning out clean towels, and lots of them.

Spotlight on Tyler

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Sea lion Tyler is a stand-out character in the already outstanding A Holiday Fantasea.

In fact, he just might upstage Santa with his expanded repertoire of natural behaviors that includes a front flipper stand and a stand-and-wave posture that will have you applauding this 375-pound pinniped with the thundering baritone bark.

Shedd saddened by loss of beluga whale

The Shedd Aquarium family is mourning the loss of Puiji, one of the original animals in our beluga group. The 25-year-old whale died Wednesday evening. Puiji had been part of Shedd’s animal collection since 1989 and was here when the Oceanarium opened.

Ken Ramirez, executive vice president of animal care and training, said that his staff and the animal health team had been monitoring Puiji for several months because of a health issue that they were treating.

A Root Canal for Kenai

During sea otter Kenai’s head-to-tail annual physical exam last year, the veterinary team noticed a crack in her left upper canine tooth. “So we took digital radiographs of the teeth and skull,” says Dr. Lisa Naples, one of Shedd’s veterinarians and section chief of conservation medicine. “Just like when you go to the dentist, when they do their routine radiographs of your teeth, they can see if a tooth is healthy or not.”