Wetlands Institute

Another rainy day in Ocean City and I was in the mood to get out of the house and do something new. I'd been reading about the Wetlands Institute in Stone Harbor, so following a morning trapped indoors by the weather, we hopped in the car for a fun adventure.

If you're headed from Ocean City, it is an easy drive--straight down the GSP, exiting at Stone Harbor Drive. It is just past the exit for the Cape May Zoo, a charming little spot when you're in need of a beach reprieve. Combined with the Wetlands Institute, it would be a great day trip.

The Wetlands Institute (http://www.wetlandsinstitute.org/) is a cedar-shingled building surrounded by wetlands. They focus on education, specifically the wetlands and shore environments and, in particular, terrapins. If you've ever helped a turtle cross the road in Strathmere (and no, this is not the beginning of a bad joke), you might not know that you were "volunteering" for the Wetlands Institute!

We got there just in time to join into a presentation just for kids--all about Spongebob Square Pants. It was cleverly done. The kids were shown pictures of the characters from Spongebob, given the opportunity to talk about each one, and then shown what the real sea creature looks like. Then, the kids got the chance to actually touch a sea sponge (as in Bob), a sea snail (Gary), a sea star (Patrick) and a spider crab (Mr. Krabs). Will, who had been nicknamed by his first grade teacher "Dr. Will" for his love of science and his penchant for stealing away class discussion and directing it towards a topic he is interested in, was captivated. He's now on a quest to find a sea star so he can break it in half and grow his own.

The Institute is also home to two osprey, now proud parents of four chicks. They have a camera on the nest and we got to see the mama osprey leave the nest to stretch her wings, while the father stayed guard, and then return to feed her baby chicks. An amazing sight.

Another part of the Institute focuses just on terrapins. Interns from Stockton College work on helping injured turtles and taking eggs from turtles that have been run over in the street. (Eggs that have been fertilized can be grown in captivity.) Will, again, loved all the details about the turtles, and we learned the correct way to pick one up to help it across the road. Carter, Charlotte and I loved seeing all the baby turtles swimming around in the tank.

The kids' favorite part was a building filled with hands-on exhibits, including an opsrey nest for the kids to climb in. It is a small space (and would certainly be a whole lot easier to navigate if it were not for people like Lincoln and Tristan's mom thinking that the entire place only existed for her to take photos of her bratty boys. I digress, but would be remiss if I didn't also mention that I was as grossed out at her mom jeans as I was annoyed by her children.) and full of things to see. The highlight, in my opinion, was a teaching pool, a shallow tank filled with creatures the kids were allowed to pick up. Will loved that many of the exhibits focused on some of the treasures he's been finding on the beach, including horseshoe crabs and "mermaid's purses," which, we know now, are actually skate egg cases. They had several exhibits with buttons to push, drawers to open and puzzles to assemble, to the delight of both Carter and Charlotte (and every other child in there). On Tuesdays and Thursdays at 3:15, they do an aquarium feeding. That was the event that brought us to the Institute to begin with, but it was crowded and Charlotte was getting antsy, so we opted to skip it and headed to the gift shop instead.

Of course, you had to walk through the gift shop to get to the exhibits. Maybe that was the real highlight for the kids. It was filled with stuffed animals, including many ducks and birds. Charlotte does a deep-throated half growl, half quack when she sees a duck and entertained everyone with her very,very loud animal sounds.

Admission is $7 for adults and $5 for children over 2. They had so many more events we want to try, we go the family membership for $40. We plan to go back for a fishing trip on Saturday. (They bait the hooks, cast the lines and the kids get to pull them in, catching mostly sea weed, or so I'm told.) Had we been better dressed for cold, windy weather, we would have stayed for the marsh walk, a guided tour through the marshland, or gone bird watching from the observatory. I'd love to go back one day for the kayak tour through the back bays.

This was a great rainy day activity and I'm sure we'll go a lot this summer. We're not going to wait for a rainy day to go back though. It would be worth a day of sunshine to explore.