Georgia Aquarium

Last Saturday I took in the Georgia Aquarium prior to hitting the Philips Arena for the Sugarland show. I took quite a few pictures, but am only going to bore you with the ones below. Actually, I'd love to show you more, but my upload speed is ridiculously slow tonight.

I've loved the Lion Fish ever since seeing them on my Go Fish deck of cards as a kid.
I don't remember many of the stats Gary mentioned while on my behind the scenes tour, so I can't tell you how big this viewing area is or how thick the glass material is. All I can tell you is the conversation between the diver feeding the fish and the little girl was pretty amusing. I believe this exhibit was called Deep Sea Voyager.
Deep Sea Voyager was my favorite exhibit. It also hand a tunnel you could go through and watch the fish and in this case a manta ray swim around and above you.
During my behind the scenes tour, I got to see the top side of all the exhibits. Here's the top of Deep Sea Voyager where you can see one of their spotted Whale Sharks. The fish do not get live food. (Having fresh "sushi" and plenty of it helps keep the fish from eating one another). When feeding the whale sharks, the divers will hop in a blow-up raft and pull themselves across the top of the water in between the roped off lane you can see below. Their food is in very tiny pieces, so by dropping the food in a lane, it allows the Whale Sharks to swim beneath the lane and get mouthfuls of food to filter out all at once.
I don't recall the name of the exhibit below, but this very elaborate setup is to replicate conditions for coral to live and grow. This area had a glass ceiling to let natural light in and as you can see, many artificial "suns". Just beyond the lights you can see a waterfall dumping. This is how they replicate the waves needed for the coral to thrive. The trough fills, then dumps, and repeats over and over again.
If all but one of Georgia Aquariums exhibits are salt water tanks and Atlanta is not located on the coast, how do they get the salt water needed?

I doubt this question crossed your mind, but if it did, here's the answer:
Okay, so that doesn't answer the question fully, but it's an integral part. The facility is built to minimize evaporation, reuse/filter water, and capture rain water. It was amazing to learn how the facility was planned around what fish they wanted to feature and what was needed regarding transport, doctor exams, cleaning, feeding, viewing, and maintaining the habitats.

And if you were wondering, there is no 3-second rule when preparing food for the fish. If it hits the floor, it goes in the trash.

Oh, and, all of their medical equipment is on wheels so it can be brought to tank-side exams.

My last random bit of knowledge... before surgery, they are able to administer anesthesia to fish through the water.