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Our Story
The Story Behind Mertailor's Mermaid Aquarium Encounter
From Mermaid Tails to an Aquarium Unlike Any Other
Mertailor began with an unusual idea: make the fantasy of becoming a mermaid feel real. Years later, that same idea has grown into an aquarium where imagination, animal care, education, and underwater performance share the same space.
Located in Lecanto, Florida, in the heart of Citrus County and just minutes from Crystal River, Mertailor's Mermaid Aquarium Encounter is the next chapter of a story that started long before the first guest ever walked through our doors.
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Where It Started
A Dream Built One Mermaid Tail at a Time
Before there was an aquarium, there was Mertailor. What began with sculpting, molding, painting, and building realistic mermaid tails became a creative business known for turning an idea that once existed mostly in imagination into something people could actually experience.
Those early years were hands-on in every sense of the word. Designs were developed, tested, changed, and built through countless hours of making. The goal was never simply to create a costume. It was to make the experience of becoming a mermaid feel believable.
Eventually, that raised a much bigger question: what happens when you build a place where that imagination can actually come alive underwater?
When Imagination Became a Place
Creating a World Beyond the Tail
Mertailor's Mermaid Aquarium Encounter grew from that same desire to make imagination tangible. Instead of creating only what a mermaid wears, we began creating the world around the mermaid: underwater habitats, live performances, animal encounters, and spaces where families could explore together.
Today, guests can watch mermaids and mermen perform underwater while sharks, rays, and tropical fish move through the habitat around them. But the performance is only one part of the experience. Beyond the main exhibit is a growing collection of animals and educational experiences designed to encourage guests to look closer and ask questions.
Where Imagination Meets Reality. That idea has become more than a tagline. It describes the unusual space Mertailor occupies between creativity, zoological care, education, and entertainment.
More Than Mermaids
The Animals Changed the Story
As the aquarium grew, so did our responsibility to the animals in our care. Our collection includes sharks, rays, marine and freshwater fishes, invertebrates, reptiles, and rescued or rehomed parrots. Some animals came to us when previous owners could no longer provide appropriate long-term care. Others were born or hatched here.
That growth changed Mertailor too. Caring for living animals requires consistency, documentation, specialized habitats, life-support systems, nutrition, observation, veterinary relationships, training, and a willingness to keep learning. Much of that work happens long before the doors open and continues after the last guest leaves.
Animal Care
Daily husbandry, water-quality monitoring, feeding, behavioral observation, habitat maintenance, enrichment, and health assessment are part of the work behind every exhibit.
Rescue & Rehoming
A number of animals in our care came from situations where individuals or previous caretakers could no longer meet their needs, giving us an opportunity to provide continued long-term care.
Breeding & Learning
Our work also includes successful breeding and rearing of several small shark species, allowing our team to study reproduction, egg development, neonatal care, and long-term husbandry firsthand.
Behind the Experience
Animal Care Doesn't Stop When Guests Aren't Looking
Some of the most important moments at an aquarium never happen in front of an audience. Animals are weighed, examined, observed, moved when necessary, treated under veterinary guidance, and monitored by the people who know their normal behaviors.
Our team continually evaluates water quality, appetite, body condition, behavior, habitat use, social interactions, and the way animals respond to their environment. Interactive experiences are adjusted around the needs of the animals—not the other way around.
We continue to strengthen our husbandry practices, recordkeeping, training, and institutional standards as Mertailor grows as a zoological facility.
Learning by Getting Closer
Turning Curiosity Into Connection
Education at Mertailor does not have to feel like a lecture. Sometimes it begins with a child touching a sea star for the first time, watching a stingray glide beneath their hand, seeing a shark egg developing, or discovering that an animal they once feared behaves very differently than they expected.
Experiences such as Ray Bay, Tide Pool Findings, animal feedings, exhibits, and staff interactions give guests a reason to slow down and notice how animals move, eat, adapt, and respond to the world around them.
We believe those small moments matter. A memorable encounter can become a question. A question can become curiosity. And curiosity is often where respect for wildlife begins.
An Unexpected Part of an Aquarium
Feathers Belong in Our Story Too
Not every resident at Mertailor swims. Our rescued and rehomed macaws and cockatoos have become an important part of the aquarium experience and of the story we tell about responsible animal ownership.
Parrots are intelligent, social, long-lived animals whose needs can be far greater than people expect when bringing one into a home. Their care includes enrichment, social interaction, appropriate diets, training, observation, and a commitment that can span decades.
For guests, these birds provide another opportunity to understand that good animal care begins with understanding what an animal actually needs—not simply what we want from it.
Still Growing
Building a Stronger Zoological Facility
Mertailor's story is still being written. As the aquarium grows, we are putting greater structure behind the work: expanding animal-care standards, formalizing operating procedures, strengthening records, developing species-specific management practices, and continuing programs that can contribute useful knowledge and experience within the zoological community.
Shark Breeding
Our captive breeding work with small shark species includes egg monitoring, embryo development, hatching, neonatal care, and successful rearing of pups.
Professional Animal Care
We continue developing more formal husbandry, training, medical, emergency, and recordkeeping systems as the collection and organization mature.
Working With Others
Our long-term direction includes stronger collaboration with veterinarians, aquariums, zoological professionals, educators, and other organizations that share an interest in responsible animal care.
Rooted in Citrus County
A Different Kind of Florida Aquarium
Mertailor's Mermaid Aquarium Encounter is located in Lecanto, Florida, in Citrus County and only minutes from Crystal River. We are an indoor aquarium built here in our local community—not a branch of a national attraction and not a traditional theme park.
Families visiting Crystal River, Homosassa, Inverness, and Florida's Nature Coast can add an entirely different experience to their trip: sharks, stingrays, rescued birds, touch tanks, marine education, and live underwater mermaid performances all under one roof.
The Next Chapter
Come Be Part of the Story
What started with a mermaid tail has become something much larger: a place for animals, families, education, creativity, and experiences that are difficult to find anywhere else. And we're still building what comes next.
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