July 7th is "Seahorse Day"! "Tatsu Festival" Summer Event Full of Seahorses to be Held

Ise Sea Paradise, a "Zero Distance Aquarium" located in Ise City, Mie Prefecture, will host a special event, [Ise Sea Summer Tatsu Festival], from Wednesday, July 1, 2026, to Monday, August 31, 2026, in conjunction with "Seahorse Day" on July 7th, a day designated by the aquarium. As a special project unique to our aquarium, which boasts the largest number of seahorse species in Japan, we will hold events where visitors can enjoy learning about the charms of seahorses, including a transparent specimen making workshop, a photo contest, and the first-ever seahorse general election. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ■ Learn About Seahorses with Transparent Specimens! ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ This is an experiential event themed around "transparent specimens," which allow observation of the internal structure of fish. Participants can learn about the differences between seahorses and other fish while actually making their own transparent specimens. Completed specimens can be taken home, making it a recommended activity for summer vacation research projects. [Dates] Saturday, July 4th, Sunday, July 5th, Tuesday, July 7th, Saturday, July 11th, Sunday, July 12th [Time] Starts at 12:30 PM (approx. 1 hour) *Reception opens at 12:20 PM [Capacity] 10 people per day *15 people on July 7th only [Participation Fee] 1,500 yen (tax included) *Admission fee separate [Target Audience] Elementary school students and older (up to 2 accompanying adults allowed) *Younger elementary school children require adult accompaniment [Meeting Location] Contact Fish Hall Counter *Please present your reservation screen [Application Method] Reservation required *Advance reservations via the official Ise Sea Paradise reservation website (cancellations not accepted) [Workshop Content] *Lecture on seahorse ecology and physical characteristics *Creation of transparent specimens (sealed in a small bottle with scientific name written) ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ■ Seahorse Day Photo Contest 2026 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ We are seeking seahorse photos from people across the country. Photos taken at Ise Sea Paradise are welcome, as are works taken in the wild or at other facilities. Winners will receive original Ise Sea Paradise merchandise. [Submission Period] Wednesday, July 1, 2026 – Thursday, August 20, 2026 [Selection Method] Likes received from Wednesday, July 1, 2026, to Monday, August 31, 2026 ⇨ Decisions will be made based on the selection by our keepers from the top-liked entries. [Winner Announcement] Mid-September 2026 (Scheduled to be announced on official X and Instagram) [How to Enter] Post on X or Instagram with the hashtag "#タツノオトシゴの日フォトコン2026" [Prizes] Free aquarium admission tickets, limited edition Sea Paradise original goods, etc. [Notes] *Photos must be taken by the entrant. *Entries can be submitted multiple times during the submission period, but entries from private accounts will be invalid. *Photos submitted outside the submission period or from last year's photo contest are also invalid. *By entering the photo contest, you grant the aquarium the right to use your photos on its website, social media, and other advertising media free of charge. *The aquarium is not responsible for any disputes arising between third parties regarding the publication of photos. *The content of the photo contest is subject to change without notice. Personal information provided by winners for prize shipping and related communications will be used by Ise Futami-ga-ura Paradise Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "the Company"). The provided personal information will be handled in accordance with the Company's privacy policy and will not be disclosed or provided to third parties without the individual's consent. Strict management will be implemented to protect personal information, including data storage and deletion. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ■ First Ever! Seahorse General Election ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ To commemorate Seahorse Day, we will hold our first-ever "Seahorse General Election." This is a participatory event where visitors can vote for their favorite seahorse while looking at election-style posters handmade by our staff. Which seahorse will gather the most popularity? The voting results will be announced later on our official social media channels. [Voting Period] Wednesday, July 1, 2026 – Friday, July 31, 2026 *Posters will be displayed until August 31st. [Venue] Seahorse Kingdom ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ■ Seahorse Petit Quiz Vol. 2 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ This is a quiz event that can be easily participated in via smartphone. We will ask a total of 7 questions about the ecology and characteristics of seahorses, many of which are surprisingly unknown. Those who answer all questions correctly will receive an original can badge, available only here. This is a fun learning activity for both children and adults. [Event Period] Wednesday, July 1, 2026 – Monday, August 31, 2026 [How to Participate] Scan the dedicated QR code posted within the aquarium to participate. [Prize] Original can badge for answering all questions correctly (Present the screen showing all correct answers at the Contact Fish Hall counter) *One badge per smartphone *Exchange limited to once per person ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ■ Limited Edition Seahorse Day Goods Also on Sale ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ During the event period, we will also sell limited edition goods commemorating "Seahorse Day." We have prepared special items available only during this period, such as "100 limited edition" original acrylic keychains and limited seahorse fish stamps that can be purchased from July 1st to July 12th. These are recommended not only for seahorse fans but also as souvenirs or mementos of your visit. What is "Seahorse Day"... July 7th is "Seahorse Day," established by Ise Sea Paradise, which boasts the largest number of seahorse species in Japan. It was established in reference to the way seahorses swim with their heads up, resembling the number "7." The purpose is to raise awareness about the current situation and charms of seahorse species, which are declining in the wild, and to foster interest in their conservation. A hands-on aquarium popular for its "zero distance experience." Its appeal lies in exhibits where you can feel close to animals like walruses, spotted seals, penguins, and otters. ■Name Zero Distance Aquarium Ise Sea Paradise ■Location 580 Futami-cho, Ise City, Mie Prefecture, 519-0602 ■Phone Number 0596-42-1760 ■Business Hours 9:30 AM – 5:00 PM (Last admission 4:30 PM) *Hours may vary seasonally ■Admission Fees Adults: 2,400–2,800 yen | Elementary and Junior High School Students: 1,200 yen | Preschoolers (4 years and older): 600 yen *Adult prices vary by day ■Website https://ise-seaparadise.com/