Kelp Forest

Discover an underwater forest—at 28 feet, the Kelp Forest is one of the tallest aquarium exhibits in the world.

You'll get a diver's-eye view of sardines, leopard sharks, wolf-eels, and a host of other fishes as they weave through swaying fronds of kelp, just like they do in the wild.

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Location: First floor
Ecosystem: Kelp forest
Live cam: Kelp Forest Cam
Feedings: Kelp Forest Feeding, Albatross Encounter

A canopy of sunlit kelp fronds — Giant kelp provides food and shelter for a vibrant ecosystem including schools of anchovies and sharks.

A close up shot of a Garibaldi fish, that is completely orange, in front of kelp — The bright orange garibaldi is found in kelp forests of Monterey Bay but prefers the warmer waters of Southern California.

Featured animals in this exhibit

Sheephead swimming through a kelp forest

California sheephead

A sheephead hunts actively during the day, but at night they move to crevices and caves and wraps themself in a mucus cocoon.

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Leopard shark

Leopard sharks live in shallow waters of bays and estuaries and occasionally patrol the kelp forest.

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Northern anchovy

Anchovies tend to swim with their mouths wide open, straining tiny plant plankton from the water.

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Wolf-eel

A wild wolf-eel eats crabs and sea urchins by grabbing them with its jaws and crunching through their shells with its molars.

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Cool facts

Fish and a school of anchovies weaving through golden kelp fronds in the Kelp Forest exhibit

Kelp growth

Our kelp grows an average of about four inches a day and requires weekly underwater gardening by scuba divers who untangle and trim the fast-growing algae.

Rockfish

Don't be surprised if you see rockfish hanging motionless or even upside down among the kelp blades. These fish can hover without sinking or floating because they have a gas-filled sac called a swim bladder that helps them stay put.

Top-down view of the Kelp Forest Exhibit, showing the surge machine that keeps the water and kelp moving like the ocean

Water from the bay

Pumps push up to 2,000 gallons of sea water a minute through the exhibit and a specially designed surge machine creates the constant water movement that kelp needs to survive.

Live cam