Sharks and kiwis in the Square

DINNER TIME: A shark enjoys a meal at the Southern Encounter Aquarium and Kiwi House.

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A fair number of Christchurch citizens are possibly still unaware of certain wildlife in Cathedral Square. STAN DARLING has a peek.

A tuatara sits on warm stones, basking under ultraviolet light. He doesn't know it's about to rain.

It rains every second day - because Dave Bradshaw wields a hose to wet down the tuatara habitat. Bradshaw is operations manager of the Southern Encounter Aquarium and Kiwi House in Cathedral Square, Christchurch.

When water starts to fall, the two tuatara skitter into hiding. They will be back soon. They like the after-rain drips that fall, sometimes hitting their heads.

The aquarium, built in 1997 in the burnt- out shell of the old Regent Theatre, was acquired by Orana Park in 2000.

Bradshaw and his staff are awaiting a possible rare event for a kiwi tourist attraction. The male of a young pair is having a later- morning start these days because he's busy sitting on an egg.

Two previous eggs, both smaller than usual, were infertile, but this could be the one.

Later this year, the egg will be sent to Orana Park if it shows promise. There, it can receive more sophisticated incubation care.

The aquarium is as impressive as when it was opened. You walk through a shop and find yourself seemingly underground, at the bottom of a dark cavern. Then the wrap-around high window of the marine tank appears, where huge groper and other fish are on the move. Sharks, stingrays, and smaller fish co-exist.

Every day at 3pm, a diver gets into the tank to feed them.

Depending on how well species cope with captivity, they are rotated regularly. The staff watch for signs of stress, such as sharks - which have to keep moving - getting abrasions on their snouts when they scrape against a wall. Other fish can back up against the wall and start over. A shark can't.

Animals are removed, returned to habitats similar to where they were collected, and replaced.

Bradshaw has been a diver for 20 years. He travels around the Banks Peninsula shore, to Kaikoura and sometimes the Marlborough Sounds to find new animals.

If an octopus seems to be coming up to a breeding time in its life cycle, it is returned to the wild.

Getting live food for the seahorses is the biggest challenge, says Bradshaw. Tiny shrimp are collected from the Estuary every week.

Aquarium kiwis are part of a national recovery programme started in 1991. A big display panel charts the programme's progress.

"These two are getting on well and displaying well," Bradshaw says of the Cathedral Square kiwis. Nocturnal houses are sometimes unsuccessful breeding places because of visitor disturbance, including noise.

Greeting visitors at the door is a Silver Spot, a carnivorous fish not normally found in New Zealand waters. It is only the third seen here. Most live off the southern Australian coast and around South America.

A small reflective gill spot "winks" as the fish breathes.

Like all good attractions these days, Southern Encounter has hands-on displays, such as the Touch Pool. You can get tips on panning for gold and do some yourself.

The big fish ladder holds salmon, trout and char. Then comes the popular seahorse viewing tube, with the animals wrapping their tails around ropes and plants like monkeys. If you stand close, they seem to jump out from the glass in 3-D.

Another special display tells what you can do to help save native frogs from extinction. For one thing, don't keep them as pets.

You can climb above the cavern floor to viewing platforms flanking a mountain waterfall swingbridge, and walk through a tunnel displaying small fish.

Four movies in the theatre take you into the dark abysses of Fiordland and tell the stories of marine mammals, seabirds and kiwi. The Southern Encounter Aquarium and Kiwi House, next to the Visitor Centre with its entrance off Cathedral Square, is open every day except Christmas Day, 9am to 5pm (last entry 4.30pm); kiwis on display usually from 10.30am to 4.30pm, but starting somewhat later while the egg is being incubated.

Feeding times are 1pm (trout and salmon), 3pm (marine fish), with special feeds at 11am and 4pm. Admission: adults $16, seniors, students and late teens $14, children five to 14 $6, preschoolers free; family concession $38 for two adults and up to three children.