Mote Marine Laboratory

This year's sea turtle nesting season is going great, with a leatherback on Sanibel and early nesting throughout the region. But few turtle lovers forget last season when early signs were record-breaking but the season's results were heart-breaking

Mote Marine Laboratory’s Sea Turtle Conservation and Research Program (STCRP) documented the first local sea turtle nest of the 2024 season on Sunday, April 28, on Venice Beach. This marks the beginning of a crucial period for sea turtle conservation.

A behind-the-scenes look of the new Mote Science Education Aquarium was provided recently as construction continues and the facility gets closer to its anticipated 2025 opening date. Mote SEA differs from other aquariums and attractions since science and education is in its name and is the focal point for all guest experiences.The new facility will embody Mote’s vision of Oceans for All, doubling the number of visitors exposed to marine science each year and providing no-cost opportunities for schools to utilize specialized STEM teaching labs to ensure that every child has hands-on marine science and technology experiential learning opportunities.

The carcass of sperm whale that became stranded on a sandbar and died Monday off a Venice-area beach has been towed out to sea.The Sea Tow Venice marine towing service used a heavy towline and rig line, provided by the City of Venice, to take the whale's remains 10-15 miles offshore on Tuesday.

The death of a sperm whale off the Venice coast this morning, while difficult even for marine experts who deal with such things, could be a learning experience for them."Every time you see a whale in distress, like we did yesterday, it's, it's always really hard. It's really hard. And so all we can do is utilize the opportunity to learn as much about them as we can," Laura Engleby, chief of NOAA's Marine Mammal branch, said Monday morning standing on the beach near the whale's carcass. "And then that helps us understand some of the things that we can do to ultimately recover and help them. And so, in that way, that's how we have to think about it. "

Some corals were left behind during an evacuation of many corals off Florida despite water temperatures that rose far above 87 degrees.

Mote Marine Laboratory & Aquarium celebrated the official opening of its Florida Coral Reef Restoration Crab Hatchery Research Center Monday as the first fully operational Caribbean king crab hatchery that will aid in efforts to save Florida’s coral reefs.

Mote Marine Laboratory’s $130 million science and education aquarium is being built at Nathan Benderson Park along Interstate 75 in Sarasota County.

Several thousand redfish raised 17 miles inland are now swimming freely in Sarasota Bay.Those are the first of 20,000 redfish raised nowhere near a bay or inlet, but at Mote Marine’s Aquaculture Research Park, a 200-acre inland fish farm along Fruitville Road east of Interstate 75,

A 300-pound male loggerhead sea turtle discovered in distress on Fort Myers Beach is undergoing treatment after it was rescued Saturday afternoon.