Andrew Rossiter

The ocean has been part of Andrew Rossiter’s life, practically from the day he was born.

Rossiter, the director of the Waikiki Aquarium, grew up in Wales, "from the side where if you go 100 yards, you’re in the Irish Sea," where he and his mates would go diving for fun.

There wasn’t too much of interest in those murky waters, but since then, the 57-year-old Rossiter has found lots to explore around the world. After earning his doctorate in aquatic organismal ecology from the University of North Wales, he has authored two research books and pursued projects involving Canadian rivers and Africa’s Lake Tanganyika.

For the last 10 years, his focus has been the waters around Hawaii, and for the last week he’s been immersed in the aquarium’s 110th anniversary celebration (the final event, with admission cut to $1.10, is 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday).

But part of his heart still belongs to Japan, where he spent 20 years. Just before taking the Hawaii job, he was senior scientist at Japan’s largest freshwater aquarium, the Lake Biwa Museum.

It’s also where he met his wife, Yoshiko, who happily relocated to Hawaii but had to be persuaded to go along with Rossiter’s plan to convert their swimming pool to a koi pond ("Yes, more fish," he said wryly).

The focus of any small aquarium has to be narrowed, and the Waikiki Aquarium’s specialization is the propagation of corals. The method has been perfected here, he said, and aquarium staff have rescued an endangered Kaneohe Bay species and grown enough new coral in the last five years to ship out 3,000 pieces to professional researchers and public aquariums worldwide.

The aquarium and University of Hawaii scientists have involved community volunteers in clearing invasive algae from the reef just offshore.

"My plan, once we get on top of the algae," he said, "is we propagate corals here and plant them back out on the reef, to make that what it was 50 years ago."

QUESTION: What was it about the exhibits that impressed you at first sight?

ANSWER: Reality. Authenticity. And the way things were displayed, and the educational focus that permeates everything we do here.

That’s where we were with the aquarium I was with in Japan. … That’s the message we were pushing: education, aligned with exhibits. To see it being done here, I thought, was great.

Q: So that kind of cemented it for you?

A: Yeah.

Q: You’re on faculty at the University of Hawaii?

A: Yes, I’m a full-time tenured professor up there as well. Unfortunately, I don’t have time to do lectures or research. This job is all-encompassing, believe me. (Laughs.)

Q: Wouldn’t your previous research field — in colder marine environments — be completely different?

A: I did freshwater insects in the UK. I did freshwater insects, freshwater fish ecology, marine ecology in Japan — coral reefs. I did tortoise research in South Africa, when I was in Japan, and I did lake sturgeon research when I was in Canada.

Q: How different is the tropical marine environment?

A: It’s very, very different from freshwater environments because it’s a lot more diverse. There are many, many more species, and there’s a lot more happening and a lot more color and vibrancy in the life that you find in the tropics….

I worked in Lake Tanganyika in Africa for a year and a half in total, a couple of trips. The colors and the diversity in that lake match a lot of coral reefs. It’s absolutely amazing.

Q: Coming back to your arrival here: What changes did you want to make?

A: My first priority was to establish a good, equitable working relationship with UH proper. When I first came here, there was an us-and-them attitude. That’s now been corrected and we have an excellent working relationship with the people up on campus.

Q: How did that manifest itself?

A: A lot of the people here perceived it as intrusion when UH decrees came down to affect the operation of the aquarium. And some of the people up on campus did not see the merits of having an aquarium as part of the university system. So there was a lot of misunderstanding.

Q: But it’s not that unusual for universities to be affiliated with an aquarium, is it?

A: There are several university-affiliated aquariums, yes. But in this day and age, I think the general realization for many scientists, certainly those on National Science Foundation grants, is they have to communicate their findings to the public in an easily understood format.

And in my opinion, for biological research on marine life, there’s no better place to do it than here. Because we can pitch their findings in easily understood formats to a captive audience.

People come here because they like fish, they like corals, they like marine life. And we’re just giving them the icing on the cake: "Did you know this research? Did you know this?" It’s a perfect match.

Q: This location is so beautiful, but the property size is small. Isn’t that a constraint?

A: Yes, it is. Absolutely. Some of the mega-aquariums on the U.S. mainland and in Japan, you could fit this entire aquarium inside one of their exhibits….

I always pitch it as quality over quantity, because we’ve got some excellent, high-standard exhibits here. But I would be delusional and lying if I didn’t say we should have something bigger and better — A, because Hawaii deserves it, and we’re an ocean state; we should celebrate what we have out there.

And, B, in terms of putting Hawaii on the map, in terms of a tourist destination, in terms of an attraction for local people, I think Hawaii needs and deserves a larger, better state aquarium.

Q: And that’s been talked about, right?

A: Yeah, but never in really concrete terms.

Q: Wasn’t it talked about out in Ko Olina?

A: That’s right, that’s right. The Ko Olina venture, the objectives of that were completely different to what this place operates on. When I first came here, that was still bubbling away.

They’ve built an aquarium out there (at Ihilani), and the target audience and the objectives were and still are different to what we’re espousing. So right from the outset, I said I’ve got no objection at all to that because it’s a completely different demographic, and Hawaii can have two like that.

The other one was posited for Kakaako. That one, it wouldn’t have worked for numerous reasons.

Q: If you had your way, would there be another university-affiliated educational aquarium here?

A: Yes.

Q: They’d probably always keep this place, though, because it’s in Waikiki?

A: This little parcel of land is kind of like an oasis.

But I would venture to suggest that the Natatorium footprint might be useful. Rather than just mowing the building into the ground and making it a beach, I think using that footprint to make a large aquarium, it would be the largest single aquarium in the world.

We could celebrate the marine life of these islands in there. And it would honor the war dead. Because they gave their lives not for glory, not for gain, not for money, but for equality for people. And there’s nothing more egalitarian than an aquarium. People irrespective of race, color, creed, age can all visit.

Q: And has that proposal been floated in a serious way?

A: I popped it up gently, but the two factions at the moment (involved in the Natatorium demolition controversy, they don’t even talk to one another. There’s so much illogical venom spouting from both sides, it’s better to let it die down first….

Q: What is the story behind the establishment of the aquarium?

A: In 1904, Castle & Cooke was running the Honolulu Rapid Transit Authority. They had streetcars running along Kalakaua. And they wanted an attraction to draw people to the end of the line. So what they did was put an aquarium right at the last stop. …At that time it was about 200 yards that way (toward Waikiki)….

Q: Then this facility opened when?

A: This opened about 55 years ago. At that time when it was down there, it was called the Honolulu Aquarium, and when it moved here it was called the Waikiki Aquarium. …

Q: Tropical marine species were always the focus, right?

A: Yes. Local fish was the main theme…. Local fishermen used to catch them and bring them in and sell them to the aquarium. So in the early days, they used to live a couple of days.

Q: Because?

A: Rough handling. They’re pretty delicate, so you have to handle them with care. So these guys are just with hooks and pull them out of the gill nets and bring them in, in a bucket. Thankfully, those days are gone. (Laughs.)

Q: What are your immediate plans for any improvements here?

A: We’re actually going through and renovating the galleries now. So hopefully over the next one to five years we’ll renovate all the galleries and have new exhibits in there.

There’s a major new seahorse, sea dragon and pipefish exhibit. That will get under way, probably next week, take about three months to construct…. It will be the biggest change to the aquarium in nine years….

Q: Are they native to these waters?

A: We have one pipefish and we have maybe three species of seahorse.

Q: Seahorses are odd little things, aren’t they?

A: They’re remarkable, truly. We breed them regularly, and one year we had about 200 young and, of course, nowhere to put them. So what we did is we got a local school, school kids came down and we put three in a bucket and gave them to the kids. And then we took them to the reef at the back of the aquarium, and the kids released them back into the wild.

And now there’s a pretty good colony right in this area.