German Maritime Museum

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German Maritime Museum
Stralsund German Maritime Museum (01) .JPG

The Katharinenkloster with the German Sea Museum in Stralsund
Data
place Stralsund , old town, Germany
Art
opening 1951
management

Harald Benke (Director)

Andreas Tanschus (Commercial Director)
Website
ISIL DE-Sra6

The German Oceanographic Museum , also the Museum for Oceanography and Fisheries, Aquarium , in Stralsund is a museum in which mainly maritime and oceanographic exhibitions are shown. It is the main building of the German Maritime Museum Foundation ; there are also three other locations of the foundation, the Ozeaneum , the Nautineum and the Natureum .

The main house is located in the hall of the former Katharinenkirche . In numerous exhibitions , the Marine Museum offers information on fishing , environmental and marine protection , marine and ocean research, flora and fauna of the Baltic Sea region, as well as more than 600 living marine animals , including sea ​​turtles and South Sea fish, in almost 50 aquariums .

Locations of the Maritime Museum

History of the main house

The museum in the Katharinenkloster was opened on June 24, 1951 as a nature museum by its founder Otto Dibbelt . Terrariums with native amphibians and reptiles as well as aquariums with animals from the Baltic Sea and the lagoon were on display .

From 1957 the nature museum was redesigned and significantly expanded to become a museum for oceanography and fishing. Sonnfried Streicher, the successor to the museum's founder Otto Dibbelt, designed and managed the renovation. From 1958 the museum was called the Bezirksnaturkundemuseum , from 1965 marine biological exhibitions were set up. In 1966 it was given a new name with the Stralsund Museum of Oceanography , and in 1968 the first parts of the marine aquarium were built in the basement. The former monastery church was completely refurbished between 1972 and 1974 and converted into an exhibition hall, and steel buttresses were moved in, creating floors in the hall. In 1974 the Marine Museum - Museum of Oceanography and Fisheries was opened and in 1975 the marine aquariums in the Catherine Hall. To mark the 750th anniversary of the founding of the city of Stralsund, the extension wing of the marine aquarium was opened in 1984 with a 50,000 liter and a 30,000 liter aquarium.

Model of the Stralsund Marine Museum in the Gothic Katharinenkloster

The top floor was expanded in 1986 and has since housed the depot for the museum's scientific collections. The first part of the human and sea exhibition on the upper floor opened in 1989. In the same year, a visitor room with 15 aquariums and the museum café were opened and the extension for the aquarium technology was completed. On November 4, 1993, the Baltic department in the marine aquarium was reopened.

The previously municipal marine museum was transferred in 1993/1994 to the "Foundation of the German Museum for Oceanography and Fisheries". In 1995 a scientific experimental and breeding facility was built and the preparation workshops were modernized. In the same year Harald Benke took over the management of the museum. From October 1998 the foundation was called the German Maritime Museum, Museum of Oceanography and Fisheries. Aquarium .

On July 16, 1999, the reconstructed and redesigned North Sea aquarium was reopened. On January 30, 2004, a multi-purpose building was opened in the visitor courtyard, which houses the 350,000 liter aquarium for the sea turtles and the museum bistro. On July 17th, 2009 the Mediterranean aquarium was opened.

Postage stamp (2001)

In October 2016, a concept for the redesign of the marine museum was presented. Afterwards, the museum will make life in the oceans tangible by means of a “tour” along the equator. 30 million euros are planned for the renovation of the exhibitions. Following an architectural competition in 2017, construction work should begin in September 2019 and the museum should then be reopened in May 2022 after closing in spring 2020. Currently (as of June 2020) the museum will be closed from January 1, 2021 until spring 2023.

Honors

On the occasion of the 50th anniversary, the Federal Republic of Germany issued a postage stamp and a commemorative coin . In addition, the museum, which is one of the ten best-visited in Germany, is in the Blue Book , a list of 20 important so-called cultural lighthouses in the so-called new federal states .

Directors

The building of the Maritime Museum with a courtyard

building

Since its foundation in 1951, the museum has been located in the former St. Catherine's Monastery, which has not been used by the church since the Reformation . In order to preserve the building in its original form, a self-supporting steel structure was installed in the 1970s, which also enables flexible heights in the spatial design of the exhibition.

division

The museum is spatially divided into the forecourt surrounded by a wall and the museum buildings, the three-storey exhibition hall (former monastery church), the Baltic Sea exhibition in the central building (formerly winter refectory and chapter house), the sea aquariums in the basement, the museum shop in the west wing (former religious school), the sea turtle aquarium in the new building as well as in the rooms for the preparation of the exhibits, the building of the management, technical supply facilities, work rooms of the scientists and the "Forum Meeresmuseum".

Forecourt

The cutter SAS 95 "Adolf Reichwein" stands on the spacious forecourt, which is full of people waiting at the entrance at particularly busy times . The wood cutter was in 1949 on the Bodden shipyard in Damgarten and was one of the first boats of the GDR deep-sea fishing. It was used on the Baltic and North Sea until 1969 and was transferred to the museum courtyard in 1973.

On a wall in the entrance area there is a knowledge test of the route to European brick Gothic with numerous questions and answers.

Exhibition hall

The former monastery church is divided into three levels by means of a space bar construction. On the ground floor there is a model (section) of the former church with its steel framework.

Exhibitions

The German Maritime Museum offers six permanent exhibitions: “Oceanography and Marine Biology”, “Whales”, “The History of Fisheries”, “GDR Fisheries”, “People and the Sea” and “Baltic Sea Coast”. In addition, information about Hermann Burmeister and his research is presented in the nearby Burmeister house . Special exhibitions and traveling exhibitions complete the museum offer.

Oceanography and marine biology

The permanent exhibition “ Oceanography and Marine Biology ” on the ground floor forms the starting point for a tour.

The water cycle is shown in the showcase "Without water, remember that ..." . A cutaway model of the Katharinenhalle shows the redesign and current use of the former monastery church.

A seven meter long relief section of the North Atlantic between New York and Lisbon shows the shape of the sea floor with its deep sea plains , mountains and trenches. The basics of plate tectonics and the development of oceans are conveyed in graphics . On a twelve square meter, 200 million year old limestone slab from a limestone quarry in Rüdersdorf near Berlin , around 2300 shells of various fossil shells have been preserved. Remains of cephalopods can be seen on a cut limestone slab from Öland . In a one cubic meter glass cube, the salt content of seawater is demonstrated using a 35 kilogram.

Various models of research vessels, such as the French “Pourquoi-pas?” (1908), the German “Meteor” (1922) and the “Professor Albrecht Penck” as well as the submersible “Trieste”, testify to the efforts of the people, the seas and to explore the deep sea. A display board and a staging of the deep-sea world also illustrate life in inhumane depths. Three tropical aquariums and one Mediterranean aquarium present crabs , crabs , starfish and other invertebrates alongside coral reefs.

A groomed young gray seal and harbor seal illustrate information about these animals. There is also an 800 year old mummified crabeater seal on display. The skeleton of a manatee in the same showcase dates from 1926 . They and the skeleton and face mask of an elephant seal are gifts from the Wittenberg Ethnological Museum. The face mask is the only one to have survived from a bull prepared by Karl Kästner in 1936, which came from the Berlin Zoo and weighed around 2,000 kilograms and was 4.50 meters long. Another theme of the exhibition are bony and cartilaginous fish such as swordfish and tiger shark . Also on display are prepared dolphins and the skeleton of a porpoise .

Fin whale skeleton

The marine museum pays special attention to the hard corals . These cnidarians are shown on the ground floor of the hall ; also a nine meter high section of a coral reef. The coral sticks and the animal exhibits that represent the reconstructed reef were collected during expeditions by the museum staff in 1976 and 1979 in the Red Sea. This reef has been restored and partially redesigned since 2011.

Whales

The permanent exhibition " Whales " is located in the former choir .

The main part of the exhibition is a 15-meter-long, approx. 1000-kilogram skeleton of a young fin whale that stranded on the west coast of Rügen in 1825 . It's hanging on the ceiling. Dry specimens of the trachea , blood vessels and penis of the animal are also displayed in a showcase .

The skull hanging on one of the walls comes from a 7.50 meter long orca that was stranded near Mukran in 1851 . On the other wall is the skeleton of a seven-meter-long northern duck whale that was stranded on Gellen in 1993 . You can also see the cast of a female porpoise with a cub and a group of five dolphins .

History of fishing

The permanent exhibition “History of Fisheries” is presented on the first floor of the museum hall. The history of fishing stretches from the fishing equipment of primitive society through antiquity and the Middle Ages . In addition to equipment and documents from the 19th century, the best-documented era follows with the fishing of the 20th century. Models of fishing vessels, the originals of which are shown in the Nautineum , such as the Zeesboot STR 9 , as well as an original beach boat from Breege, bear witness to the transition to industrial fishing.

On display are harpoons , fishhooks and trap baskets as well as a replica dugout canoe , the model of a herring boise , fishing gear and the model of the fish steamer "Turbot".

In some showcases, the methods of coastal fishing on the Western Pomeranian Baltic Sea coast are shown using exhibits from the islands of Rügen and Usedom as well as from Fischland and Darß . A model of an outdoor beach trap shows how it works. Another exhibit is a gillnet made of synthetic fibers.

Model of an Atlantic super trawler in the "GDR Fishery" exhibition

GDR fishing

The permanent exhibition "GDR fishing" is dedicated to fishing between the years 1949 and 1990 in the German Democratic Republic (GDR). Established in the early 1970s, the exhibition was based on the collaboration between the Marine Museum and the VEB Kombinat Hochseefischerei Rostock, which, as a sponsor, made the museum's development possible.

The exhibition was redesigned after 1990 with funding from the European Union and the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania as part of the “Community initiative PESCA” and deals with the “development of global sea fishing after the Second World War using the example of the development of coastal and deep sea fishing in the GDR "; the character of the original exhibition was largely retained. The 17-meter cutter SAS 95 "Adolph Reichwein" is part of the exhibition in the forecourt of the museum. Shown is the story of the difficult new beginning after the Second World War, the development of the GDR fishing fleet in the 1950s with the collectivization of coastal fishing, the change in fishing vehicles from side catchers to trawlers , a rear catcher, and the use of fishing and processing vessels from the GDR -in-house production like the Atlantik-Supertrawler . A four-meter-long model of the “Atlantic Supertrawler”, which was built mainly for the Soviet Union in more than 200 pieces at the Stralsund shipyard, and an overview of the fishing vessels of the GDR fleet complete this exhibition. Fishing methods such as bottom trawling , pelagic nets , hunting nets and purse seine are explained using models. Depth sounder and earlier devices used to detect fish are shown as well as the products of fishing: canned , fresh fish and more.

Leatherback turtle in the exhibition "Man and the Sea"
Giant octopus in the marine museum
Diorama in the exhibition "Baltic Sea Coast"

Man and sea

The permanent exhibition "Man and the Sea" on the second floor is under the motto "A healthy sea - a prerequisite for life on earth!"

Prepared emperor penguins can be seen in the "Kindergarten of the Emperor Penguins" . The exhibition also includes a bathy probe from the research vessel Valdivia and a model of the research vessel Glomar Challenger . Furthermore, specimens of over 100 herrings in a school of fish, a god salmon and a moonfish are shown.

A leatherback turtle , which was prepared in the Marine Museum in 1965 and weighed 450 kilograms during its lifetime, is also part of this part of the museum, as is information on the life and reproduction of sea ​​turtles . Sturgeon and coelacanth testify to the threat to sea creatures from humans. A model of a Japanese giant crab as well as sunfish and god salmon show the diversity of the inhabitants of the water, which makes up 70% of the earth's surface. The latest exhibit is a prepared polar bear . The models of a walrus , an octopus and seals are also impressive .

Baltic coast

The permanent exhibition "Baltic Sea Coast" in the central building provides information about the flora and fauna of the Baltic Sea coast , the specific conditions of water depths and salinity in the Baltic Sea and the problem of water exchange with the ocean.

The three seal species found in the Baltic Sea, the gray seal , ringed seal and harbor seal, are shown in a diorama . Another diorama shows a porpoise washed up on a beach ; further dioramas and showcases show the bird world and bird migration on the coast.

The exhibition was changed compared to the previous exhibition after 2010 and adapted to the needs of the museum.

The aquariums

In the Marine Museum, the aquariums are divided into four areas: tropical aquarium, Mediterranean aquarium, sharks and turtles. With the exception of four small aquariums in the entrance area, the basins are in the vaulted cellar.

technology

Sea turtle in the Stralsund Marine Museum
Poisonous lionfish in the tropical aquarium
Tropical aquarium in the Stralsund Marine Museum

The keeping of marine animals was preceded by extensive research into seawater. Especially the Challenger expedition from 1872 to 1876 brought important knowledge about the composition of sea water. Since the Stralsund Museum does not have direct access to the ocean and thus to the sea water it needs, water from the North Sea with a salt content of around 33 ‰ was used; Since 1990 the sea water has been produced artificially, whereby industrially manufactured sea salt mixtures are used. For comparison: the salinity of the Baltic Sea off Rügen is approx. 8 ‰, that of the open oceans 35 ‰.

The water for the hot water area is heated up to 25 ° C. In some cases, the temperatures of the aquariums are adjusted to the natural course of the year. Many of the aquariums to be seen in the exhibition are combined to form a water cycle. Huge clean water chambers and filter chambers are not visible to visitors to the Marine Museum. Using circulating pumps , the water is passed through filters at least every two hours, where the organic suspended matter is collected. The pre-filters are cleaned daily. The water passed through the filters then reaches the pure water chambers, where it is brought back to the required temperature and then passed back into the show tank by means of circulating pumps via protein skimmers .

The required quality of the water in aquariums can only be ensured through accompanying measures. While excretions from animals in the sea are useful for plankton, for example , they can quickly contaminate the water with bacteria, invisible to the viewer. Therefore the pH value and the redox potential have to be measured continuously . A decrease in quality is counteracted , for example, by adding sodium carbonate and sodium bicarbonate or by using UV light . The small amount of algae is striking . This is due to the fact that many of the fish eat the algae. In addition, the fish must be protected against skin parasites with medication ; these drugs counteract the growth of algae.

Tropical aquarium

This section represents the oldest part of the show aquariums still in existence. The eye-catcher in this section is pool 18, which with 50,000 liters is the second largest pool in the museum. In addition to moray eels , triggerfish and porcupine fish, various types of shark, such as bamboo and raccoon shark, find a home here. The poisonous lionfish and stone fish , cleaner fish , seahorses , cuttlefish and pearl boats live in the aquariums .

In this area u. a. Soft and hard corals presented a display tanks shows symbiosis between clownfish and Riffanemonen .

Mediterranean aquarium

Certain fish, coral species and invertebrates from the Mediterranean Sea are featured in this collection of pools . A harbor, a rock wall and a rock occupied by lobsters are shown in the aquariums.

A coral reef has been recreated in a round basin, which is home to red anthers , doctor fish , badger faces and gobies . Other aquarium inhabitants are white ribbon and cardinal shrimp , disc anemones , wrasse and angelfish .

Sharks

The second largest with 50,000 liters of the aquarium Oceanographic Museum shows the fish tropical coral reefs, as hemiscylliidae , Marder sharks , eels , trigger fish , pufferfish , porcupinefishes , doctor fish and mackerel .

Sea turtles

The marine museum's largest aquarium with a capacity of 350,000 liters was opened in January 2004 and houses turtles . It is designed as a coral reef and also offers an artificial beach that is supposed to be used by the turtles to lay their eggs. In addition to the turtles, coral fish and, since 2005, blacktip reef sharks also live in this aquarium .

Publications

Sea and museum

The “Meer und Museum” series has been published since 1980, with 24 volumes published by 2012:

  • Volume 1: The Stralsund Marine Museum - development, tasks, work results (1980)
  • Volume 2: Acropora 1976 and 1979, two marine biology collecting trips to the Red Sea (1981)
  • Volume 3: The coastal bird sanctuary "Islands Oie and Kirr" (1982)
  • Volume 4: The Stralsund Marine Museum - an example of the profiling process of the natural science museums in the GDR (1986)
  • Volume 5: The Greifswalder Bodden (1989)
  • Volume 6: The Stralsund Marine Museum from 1982 to 1988 and contributions from its sphere of activity (1990)
  • Volume 7: The Marine Museum in 1989/1990 (1991)
  • Volume 8: Snails, mussels, cephalopods - about molluscs from the Marine Museum (1992)
  • Volume 9: Herrmann Burmeister - an important natural scientist of the 19th century (1993)
  • Volume 10: Looking into the sea, experiencing the sea - The German Museum for Oceanography and Fisheries (1994)
  • Volume 11: The stranding of the duck whales in 1993 near Hiddensee (1995)
  • Volume 12: Telemetry and Deep Sea Research in the Sea (1996)
  • Volume 13: The Wismar Bay and the Salzhaff. Warning signals from the Baltic Sea (1997)
  • Volume 14: Coral Reefs - Endangered Wilderness of Tropical Seas (1998)
  • Volume 15: The Future of the Ocean (1999)
  • Volume 16: The Darß-Zingster Bodden - monograph of a unique coastal landscape (2001)
  • Volume 17: Fish and Fisheries in the Baltic and North Sea (2003)
  • Volume 18: Strelasund and Kubitzer Bodden (2005)
  • Volume 19: Otto Dibbelt and the creation of the Nature Museum in Stralsund (2006)
  • Volume 20: Polar Research - Travel and Research by German Scientists in the Polar Regions (2007)
  • Volume 21: The bird world on the island of Hiddensee (2008)
  • Volume 22: A museum sets sail - the OZEANEUM in Stralsund (2009)
  • Volume 23: Whales and Seals in the Baltic Sea (2011)
  • Volume 24: All handwork - small fishing vessels on the Baltic coast (2012)

Historical and marine yearbook

The “Historisch-Meereskundliche Jahrbuch” is an annual series of publications by the German Marine Museum (DMM) and the German Society for Marine Research (DGM) dedicated to the history of marine research. 17 volumes were published from 1992 to 2012.

research

Model of the
Ernst Haeckel research vessel

The research objects of the employees of the marine museum are, for example, the fauna of the coral reefs in the Red Sea , marine fish, seals and whales . National and international research projects are carried out together with other institutes. The results of this research are presented in exhibitions and the museum's official publications.

Visitor numbers

During the GDR era, the museum was visited by up to 900,000 guests annually. After the GDR joined the Federal Republic of Germany , the flow of visitors declined, but in 1990 the museum was still visited by 500,000 people, making it the most visited in northern Germany.

Twenty million visitors were counted by 2001. On July 14, 1981, the museum, which at that time had no branch offices, achieved a record number of visitors: 13,079 guests viewed the exhibitions. After the fall of the Wall, most of the day visitors were counted on July 21, 2005 with 8,269 visitors. On average, around 600,000 people visit the exhibitions in downtown Stralsund as well as on Dänholm and Darß every year.

year Visitors
1990 > 500,000
1991 403,668
1992 520.454
1993 ?
1994 ?
1995 ?
year Visitors
1996 ?
1997 529,582
1998 581,406
1999 ?
2000 ?
2003 ?
year Visitor 1
2004 ?
2005 ?
2006 376,400
2007 410,000
2008 1,052,982
2009 1,212,260

1 Figures from 2008 with Ozeaneum

Sponsor

In 1991 the “Association of Friends and Supporters of the Meeresmuseum Stralsund e. V. “(VFFM) founded; this supports the maritime museum and is the second donor in the German Maritime Museum Foundation. In addition, the association organizes numerous excursions and lectures.

literature

  • German Maritime Museum Stralsund - Museum guide . Edited by the German Maritime Museum Stralsund, 2004.
  • Stralsund marine aquarium . Edited by the German Maritime Museum Stralsund.
  • Karl-Heinz Tschiesche: seahorses, puffer fish and octopus . 2005, ISBN 3-356-01096-4 .

Web links

Commons : Meeresmuseum Stralsund  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. Ostsee-Zeitung Stralsund, September 30, 2016
  2. Marine Museum Stralsund closed for two years
  3. ^ Oceanography and Marine Biology ( Memento from March 15, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), meeresmuseum.de
  4. ^ History of fishing ( memento from June 13, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), meeresmuseum.de
  5. ^ GDR fishing ( memento from June 13, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), meeresmuseum.de
  6. Man and the Sea , meeresmuseum.de
  7. ^ Ostseeküste ( Memento from June 13, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), meeresmuseum.de
  8. Sonnfried Streicher in: Meer und Museum , Volume 7, 1991
  9. a b January to November, source: Ostsee-Zeitung Stralsund, December 28, 2007
  10. Press release http://www.ozeaneum.de/de/presse/presse-archiv/presse-archiv-detail/daten/2009/01/05/deutsches-meeresmuseum-ist-besucher-millionaer.html ( Memento from 9. September 2012 in the web archive archive.today ) of the German Oceanographic Museum from January 5, 2009
  11. Press release http://www.ozeaneum.de/de/presse/presse-archiv/presse-archiv-detail/daten/2010/01/05/ueber-12-mio-besucher-kamen-ins-deutsche-meeresmuseum- 5.html ( memento from September 14, 2012 in the web archive archive.today ) of the German Oceanographic Museum from January 5, 2010

Coordinates: 54 ° 18 ′ 45.4 ″  N , 13 ° 5 ′ 13.5 ″  E