If you go
› What: Sharkfest.› When: 6-8:30 p.m. Friday, Aug. 5.› Where: Tennessee Aquarium, 1 Broad St.› Admission: $29.95 adults, $18.95 children 3-12 (Sharkfest activities are free with admission).› Phone: 1-800-262-0695.› Website: www.tnaqua.org.
Did you know?
› The Tennessee Aquarium’s Secret Reef exhibit is currently home to four sand tiger sharks and two sandbar sharks. Both have the typical gray or brownish coloring and body style people associate with sharks.› Sand tigers are the toothier of the two species with a row of jagged teeth that can be seen even when their mouths are closed. A sand tiger can lose thousands of teeth over a lifetime. Each time one is lost, another takes its place.› The sandbars, also known as brown sharks, swim much faster and are more agile than sand tiger sharks.› Sand tiger sharks can grow up to 10 feet in length; sandbars can reach a length of 8 feet.› Aquarium experts have target-trained the sharks to eat fish offered at the end of a long pole, which is lowered into the top of the exhibit. Both species are offered food three times a week. They receive mackerel or bonita that is fortified with a nutritionally complete supplement (sort of like a shark multivitamin).› The amount of food offered to the sharks is closely monitored and recorded to make sure each individual shark is fed enough to stay satiated. This decreases the chance of the sharks making a meal of their tank mates.› Four other species of sharks can be seen (and touched) in the Tropical Cove. In the Stingray Bay touch tank are epaulette sharks, coral catsharks, horn sharks and a Port Jackson shark.
Sharkfest at the Tennessee Aquarium offers more than a chance to get an eye-catching hairstyle and a fierce tattoo.
Kids will surely jump in line for those enticements, but the after-hours event Friday, Aug. 5, also is a chance to learn about efforts to protect sharks, talk to scuba divers who swim with the fishes (while they’re underwater), examine a large collection of prehistoric megalodon shark teeth and even touch a few bizarre-looking shark specimens.
An added bonus is a visit by the Chattanooga filmmakers who produced “Shark Clans,” a top-rated documentary about great white sharks that aired during Discovery Channel’s Shark Week 2015.