The Andover Leisure Group delegation arrived for a two-day working visit at the Primorsky Aquarium on 29 April. The company owns a network of five aquariums and one ocean park in China. The delegation included three members of the Andover Leisure Group: President and Chief Executive Director Zhang Huihan Sindu, Curatorial Director Low Kim Wah, and Commercial Director Hang Siwen. The visit took place within the framework of the Memorandum of Understanding signed between the two organizations in August 2023 to share experience and knowledge in marine mammal husbandry and in the cultivation of open ocean invertebrates.
Several seminars were held during the first day of the visit. They raised a range of issues, including animal care and breeding. The guests spent more than three hours at the Dolphinarium, where they watched training sessions with dolphins, beluga whales, and a walrus, and learnt about Baikal seals. Our specialists also shared their expertise in performing various veterinary procedures on marine mammals.
“We had a very intense discussion,” said the Head of the Marine Mammal Division Anton Brykov. “Together, we came up with certain steps in developing our cooperation. Particularly, we agreed upon the exchange of groups of trainers and vets for a month-long training both at the Primorsky Aquarium and at the aquariums of the Chinese company.”
On the same day, the Andover Leisure Group representatives saw the jellyfish exhibit with some rarely displayed species, like comb jellies (Ctenophora), and visited the Science and Acclimation Building. Members of the Primorsky Aquarium showed them the systems for jellyfish cultivation and maintenance and answered their questions about how to collect and reproduce Ctenophora.
On the second day of the visit, the Chinese professionals and the heads of several animal care divisions and departments of the Primorsky Aquarium had a meeting with the Director Olga Shevchenko and talked about future cooperation between our two organizations. One of the decisions made was to continue our joint research efforts, as well as cooperation in the care and management of comb jellies.