Taiwan momento
Gazing down at the NMMBA from the Kueishan archaeological site within Kenting National Park, the curved, wave-like rooftops of the museum buildings small and large blend in with the natural surroundings, like wave crests breaking in a never-ending cycle. Fully matching the nature of "water" with the basic attribute of a marine museum, this structure won the 2001 Grand Award of the American Consulting Engineers Council.
Entering the museum complex, one is amazed at the enormous size of the full-scale models of the humpback and sperm whales in the Whale Waterscape exhibit. In the Waters of Taiwan pavilion, models of dolphins and the deep-sea giant octopus hang from the ceiling of the 21-meter-high main hall. To the right of the entrance the visitor is struck by a view of the soaring cliffs and Lungku Waterfall of Kukuan in Taichung County, which suffered great destruction during the earthquake of September 21, 1999.
Chang Cheng-chieh, deputy chief of the museum's guide team, says the main design theme of the museum imitates Taiwan's environment, so during the preparatory stage they took a "cast" of part of the cliffs during the dry season, unwittingly producing a magnificent vista of the Lungku Waterfall before its destruction. This quite appropriately leads visitors into the Waters of Taiwan exhibit, covering Taiwan's natural landscape from the 3,952-meter-high Yushan to the ocean at a depth of 200 meters.
Following the sound of rushing water coming from the waterfall, the visitor enters the pavilion and sees a model of the Chichiawan Creek of the Tachia River, the riverbank coniferous forests and the classic V-shaped river valley of the high mountain river. The representative fish is the Taiwan ku fish (Varicorhinus alticorpus), while the rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) stands in for the precious Formosan landlocked salmon (Oncorhynchus masou formosanus), to create a picture of Taiwan's
salmon ecology.
There follows a recreation of the middle reaches of the river in Lovers' Valley at Maolin, Kaohsiung County. The sides of the gently U-shaped valley are fully planted with broadleaved trees and the river is stocked with Taiwan's largest endemic fish species, Spinibarbus hollandi, along with Chinese catfish (Silurus asotus) and giant mottled eel (Anguilla marmorata). Next comes a recreation of the Tsengwen Reservoir. The actual reservoir has a large capacity, still waters and ample food, and contains fish of great size, including black carp (Mylopharyngodon piceus) reaching a size of 1.5 meters, and grass carp (Ctenopharyngodon idella) at 1.2 meters. The disadvantage, however, is that these invasive exotic fish species have no natural enemies, reproduce quickly and, after rapidly replacing the native species, destroy the original ecology and environment. The reservoir also becomes a killer for fish that normally migrate. Because the migration path of the ayu sweetfish (Plecoglossus altivelis) has been cut off by the reservoir, the species' population has plummeted.
Next to the reservoir you can see row upon row of oyster racks. In fish tanks groupers are swimming around. The main theme of this exhibit is the west coast aquaculture industry and its huge impact on Taiwan's ecological environment. Operators have indiscriminately opened up fishponds and destroyed marshy habitats, and have overextracted groundwater leading to problems of land subsidence and seawater encroachment. They have even introduced non-native fish and crustacean species without authorization, wantonly destroying the local ecology. In the end, when nature strikes back, they are the biggest victims.
Leaving the southwest coastal fish ponds, the visitor arrives at the Tanshui River estuary in the north. The unremarkable mudflats not only offer nutrients from both the ocean and the river, the decomposing organic detritus from dead wood and fallen leaves is also a food source for fish, shrimp, crab and shellfish larvae. On the other hand, seepage and runoff from landfills, industrial effluent and residential wastewater have led to serious pollution of the estuary and have made the mudflats fetid.
"Using this example of the serious pollution of the estuary environment, we can use the opportunity to educate visitors who are fond of eating fish. If we allow young fish to mature in this environment and later catch them for eating, in fact it is the people who will suffer," says Chang Cheng-chieh.
To show the coral reef ecology, the Coral Kingdom pavilion uses a realistic "virtual sunken ship" to demonstrate the importance of "artificial reefs."