The Ogasawara Marine Center has an exhibition hall area and a breeding area where you can see actual turtles.
The exhibition hall area offers easy-to-understand explanations of the history of the Ogasawara Islands, the ecology and evolution of the world’s sea turtles, their distribution, and other information with photos and panels. We also have plenty of green turtle skeletons on display as well as information on the ecology of humpback whales that we have studied. For those who would like to learn more about the ecology of sea turtles, we recommend the Turtle Center’s “Sea Turtle Classroom” managed by our staff, where you can learn about the surprising biology of sea turtles.
When you want to take a break from the Ogasawara sun, you can rest on a bench in the cool exhibition hall and look at informational materials or buy some original souvenirs from the Ogasawara Marine Center.
In the breeding area, we have a short-term breeding and release program to increase the survival rate of the green sea turtles. Therefore, 250 to 300 baby turtles are kept in our tanks at our Marine Center throughout the year. These turtles are released after being raised for about half a year to year. We also keep a wide range of green turtles, loggerhead turtles, and hawksbill turtles ranging in age from one year to over 20 years old. We recommend participating in the activity, “Sea Turtle Snack” where you can experience feeding the greedy green turtle, “Kota” and our visitor favorite loggerhead turtle, “Nacchan”. In addition, you can participate in our very popular photo sessions, where you can hold a real turtle in your hands. Every year in July, newly hatched baby turtles enter our tanks, so please come visit us to see them!
Link to our photo gallery of cute breeding turtles