One of the most popular exhibits at the Monterey Bay Aquarium will soon be off-limits to visitors.
The outer bay exhibit — home to the aquarium’s sharks — will be closed for nearly a year when repairs start Aug. 30.

“Part of this repair to the exhibit is to make it more habitable and also expand opportunities to add different animals in the future,” said Jon Hoech of the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

While a new set of fiberglass tiles are installed in the tank, sea creatures such as sharks, tuna and sardines will be relocated to temporary homes.

Many of the animals will stay at the Aquarium’s Care Center in Marina until the outer bay tank reopens in June 2011.

“Each species we have a different means of transporting them,” Hoech said. “Some will be netted out, some will employ stretchers and just about all of them will be put in transport crates that we will use to move them down the highway to various locations.”

Some presentations will be forced to shut down because of the closures. To compensate, the aquarium is opening up a new diving bird exhibit and a new turtle exhibit.

Also, visitors will still be able to see one of the most popular creatures at the aquarium — sharks.

“A lot of feedings will happen in the morning, we will move those up so visitors can see them when they’re visiting. The seven-gill shark feedings we will do those for our visitors, as well as bat-ray feedings and quite a few others,” said David Rosenburg of the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

Visitors will also get sneak-peek tours behind the scenes and the aquarium said it will start using text messages to alert people on the must-see exhibits featured during the day they visit the aquarium.

Even though the outer bay exhibit will close at the end of the month, another popular exhibit, the jelly fish exhibit, will remain open through the end of the year.