The Main Centre Building

Main Floor

The Marine Centre was a floating barge located adjacent to the shore, accessible by ramp.

It is now located in Cowichan Bay where the new owner  lives in it as a float home.

The lower deck included laboratory/teaching space for 30+. Seawater is pumped continuously from a depth of about 5 meters. 12 wall aquaria portrayed typical local marine habitats. 30 table top centres included either open tanks or micro-aquaria under dissecting microscopes. Each included representatives of a major animal or plant groups with a story board describing typical life styles.

Centre Equipment and Resources

ROVER

The main lab was equipped with: 2 compound microscopes, 15 dissecting microscopes, a 34" video monitor hooked up to a macrovideo camera and microscope, standard AV equipment, and a small marine biology library.

The Marine Ecology Centre purchased a new Remotely Operated Vehicle, a SeaBotix LBV. With lots of bells and whistles and a depth    capability of 150 metres. It also has colour video cameras, as well as black and white, and a three-jaw grabber to collect specimens. We used this  in some of our school programs. We often deployed ROVER off the end of the dock where an operator "flies" it over the bottom while live images are transmitted to our large video monitor.

OurVessel - Aphrodite

A six meter launch is equipped for transporting up to 12 passengers, and has an A frame and davit for deploying plankton nets, water sampling bottles, small dredges, otter board trawl and ponar grab. It also is a stable diving platform. Cruising speed is 30 knots.