Under the Sea - And Also Over It: Exploring St Andrews’ Zoo-Quarium

I’m sick of hearing that St Andrews is boring. Yes, it’s only been four weeks since break and yes, I’ve already had coffee at every cafe in town. OK, maybe the beaches are only as exciting as your first Instagram post of them. But if you’re quick to label the town as boring, maybe it’s time for a little self-reflection. A quick scroll on Google Maps (late at night before a pitch-meeting I am woefully underprepared for) reminds me that St Andrews has its very own aquarium. And like much of this town, it may be small, but it is most definitely not boring. 

The Aquarium, or as Display Manager Rachel Gordon refers to it, the ‘zoo-quarium,’ has been around for a while. Founder Guy Mace first opened doors in 1999 and has kept the business in the family ever since. Despite going on to develop and later sell the Sea Life franchise, the Mace family have clung on to their St Andrews property. 

Gordon meets me at the door and gives me a quick tour through the aquarium facilities, and pretends my level of excitement is normal for someone old enough to be at university. After four years working here, it’s clear she knows her way around and kindly dumbs down some of the more technical information for me, despite her extensive knowledge.

She tells me, “I studied Zoology as an undergraduate and I studied animal behaviour [for my]Master's degree, and I've also done a diploma in Zoo and Aquarium Management.” Though Gordon may come from a comprehensive zoology background, that is not a requirement to work at the aquarium. 

“We've had quite a lot of people [who] have had university degrees. A few of the keepers have Master's [degrees], some of them have an HNC. But we get a lot of volunteers and things like that. Junior staff are of value even when they haven’t necessarily done all the academic stuff as well.”

The small team working at the aquarium, coupled with its wide variety of creatures, makes working there a dynamic experience. “Our team all has their fingers in many pots, so we all like to get involved in every aspect of it, including the animal care, the education — just every single part of it,” Gordon said.

The enthusiasm Gordon mentioned was clear as I wandered through the exhibitions. While one Keeper teaches a group of school children about manta rays and breathing underwater, another happily tends to a small horde of meerkats. “There are a lot of species you wouldn't expect inside the building,” Gordon explained.

The aquarium, a bit like a certain university, is a zany combination of international and local. You can stand in one of the hallways and see a snapping turtle on your right and an axolotl on your left. Despite the global span of the species available, Gordon told me that most of the animals call this country home. “We primarily source from within the UK,” she said. “There [are] other places that will do international transfers, but we're a small site, so we tend to just do other collections in the UK.” 

Collaboration with other facilities across the country has proven key to both the development of this aquarium and others. “The more we work together, the more we've become hubs for conservation, rather than entertainment,” she explained. The result is a network of data that helps determine which animals end up where. The aquarium “sees what animals need our help the most, basically, and we'll make decisions based on that and what we can house.”

Conservation is central to the aquarium’s mission, and has inspired the development of local efforts to protect the environment.“We've just recently developed a partnership with RESP (The River Eden Sustainability Partnership),” Gordon explained. “So we offer our time and our help and training to do more water quality testing and things like that in the River Eden. It's a close-to-home thing that we're hopefully improving the health of by monitoring it a little bit.”

The aquarium views its conservation efforts as a way to get the public involved as well. “We're using it as a citizen science project as well, to try and get locals down on the beach as well, and helping us collect that data,” Gordon explained.

The public that the aquarium intends to work with is as diverse as the variety of creatures inside it, which Gordon attributed to its ‘unique location.’ Though many of the customers are children, “we get a huge amount of students from the University as well,” Gordon told me. “We also get a lot of golfers in when there's the Open and things like that. Anyone and everyone likes to come in.”

As for what exactly people come in to see, the meerkats and penguins have proven to be the stars of the show. “Our meerkats and our penguins are our selling points, so people like coming in to do the animal experiences with them,” Gordon said. It isn’t just the visitors who love the penguins. I asked Gordon which of the animals is her favourite, and despite a tortured expression on her face, she settled on the penguins. More specifically, JJ.

“If I had to pick one — I shouldn't pick favourites,” she told me. “But JJ the penguin was born while I was here. So she does have a special place in my heart.”

I stopped by the penguin exhibit and a curious bird sat right behind the glass, watching me just as much as I was watching him. It’s easy to see why so many people love them.

For the cold-hearted audience that can’t be tempted by cuddling meerkats, tiny monkeys or even sharks, there is still more the aquarium has to offer.

Gordon took me down to a site undergoing development, right on the sea. However, she was coy about the exact plans for the space.“I won’t go into too much detail, but I will say [to] keep an eye out for it,” she said. While much of the upcoming exhibitions remain a mystery, Gordon did tell me a new creature would be coming soon. 

For those of you still not convinced that the aquarium is worth a visit, I’ll leave you with Gordon’s best sales pitch: “You definitely get a full day out of it. You learn a little something about animals. You'll learn about the animals that are right beside you, the ones that you might not know are right on your doorstep.”

Illustration by Ramona Kirkham