Todd Gardner
  • Todd Gardner

    Todd Gardner is a professor of Aquaculture and Marine Biology at Carteret Community College in Morehead City, North Carolina where he oversees a partnership between the college and The Biota Group, a world leader in sustainably cultured marine life. Todd's life and career have been shaped by his passion for ocean life and he has written numerous scientific and popular articles about his research and experiences collecting, keeping, and culturing marine organisms. Todd’s professional background includes work on a National Geographic documentary, commercial aquaculture at C-quest Hatchery in Puerto Rico, and an 11-year term at the Long Island Aquarium where he spent much of his time developing techniques for rearing marine fish larvae. To date he has raised more than 50 species. In 2013 Todd received the prestigious Aquarist of the Year Award from the Marine Aquarium Society of North America (MASNA). In his spare time, Todd dives, photographs marine life, runs marathons, and makes music.

Recent Content

Seriously Spiny Fun: A purple urchin experiment

Seriously Spiny Fun: A purple urchin experiment

As I pointed out earlier this week, Biota NC has taken up production of many of the “cleanup crew” species offered at The Biota Group. As I also mentioned, we are the smallest facility (by a long shot) among the Biota network. Our size, therefore, is often the...

Biota NC

Biota NC

Along the southeast coast of North Carolina, overlooking Bogue Sound and the barrier island of Bogue Banks, is the town of Morehead City, the home of Biota’s newest and smallest marine ornamental fish hatchery. It’s become known, unofficially, as Biota NC and it...

A Taste of the Tropics on Christmas Morning

A Taste of the Tropics on Christmas Morning

In many neighborhoods, there's a special time between Christmas morning and Christmas dinner, when (weather permitting), people leave their houses and go outside to play with their new footballs, frisbees, drones, bicycles.... whatever they've gotten that is not...

Long Island Collecting Log: Two new range records

Long Island Collecting Log: Two new range records

It’s been a while since I’ve posted a Long Island fish collecting update, largely because I no longer live there. But 2023 is turning out to be a special year for the tropical strays that spend a fleeting month or two in the waters of the northeastern US before they...

SCUBA Dive report from Radio Island, NC

My son and I have been spoiled in recent weeks with opportunities to dive on some amazing shipwrecks off the coast of North Carolina. We’ve been blessed with near ideal conditions and massive aggregations of sharks, making for some of the most exciting underwater...

Finn Gardner, Reef Photographer

Finn Gardner, Reef Photographer

Eleven years ago, an underwater photographer was born. His name was Finn Gardner. Two weeks ago, he captured these images on his first nitrox dive, with his new GoPro. These were all taken on the wreck of the Caribsea, a freighter that was sunk by a German torpedo in...

Monday Archives: It’s Never Too Early to Start

Monday Archives: It’s Never Too Early to Start

As new parents, Ashleigh and I are faced with novel challenges on a daily basis. Among them are the universal dilemma of how to balance parenting with all of the other things we love to do; and then there’s making sure that the values that are dear to us, like our...

Happy Shark Week!

Happy Shark Week!

I love Shark Week. Not for the shows. They are mostly terrible, and I can’t watch them. I love it because it gets people thinking and talking about sharks. Although I was brought up in the age of Jaws (My dad took me to see it in the theater and I was creeped out in...

Reef Art: What is it Good For?

Reef Art: What is it Good For?

One of the great things about having incredibly talented people in your life is that when you need an outstanding gift for someone, it’s easy to nail it. The older I get, the less I want to give or receive material things as gifts, as so much of this stuff just ends...