Unfortunately, the Oceanographic Museum is now also world-famous as the alleged (see below) originator of one of greatest environmental disasters of modern times: Caulerpa taxifolia. If you go swimming in the Larvotto you may notice patches of bright green seaweed on the sea floor. This seaweed, Caulerpa taxifolia, is not native to the Mediterranean. If what you read on the internet is to be believed, it is alleged to be a genetically-modified strain of a tropical seaweed developed by the curator of Wilhelmina Zoo in Stuttgart in the 1980s. However, we have no way of checking this information. It's said it is inedible or toxic to Mediterranean fish but was quickly adopted by aquariums around the world because it is brightly coloured and difficult to kill…

In 1984, a diver allegedly noticed a one square metre patch of the distinctive tropical algae under the windows of the Monaco Oceanographic Museum, which was then under the stewardship of le Capitaine Cousteau himself. Five years later it was allegedly noted in a survey that that the weed had spread to cover one hectare.

Yes, you've guessed it. The allegation - which French courts have ruled unfounded on three occasions - was that the Oceanographic Museum, in a not terribly ecologically friendly procedure, used to clean out its tanks straight into the sea below. This would have been slightly ironic since Captain Cousteau, bless him, built a whole career out of documenting ecological disasters around the world. The alleged taxifolia contained in the Museum's effluent would have had no problem adapting to the Mediterranean waters it would now have found itself in. Whatever the origin, it allegedly spread rapidly and prolifically eliminating all other seaweeds in its path and with them the ecosystems they contained.

Now twenty years have passed and "the killer weed" has colonised coastlines as far west as Spain and as far east as Greece. And nobody can stop it. It has now even been spotted in Californian waters, quite possibly spread in the bilge water and anchor chains of the megayachts that frequent the Mediterranean.

The current director of the Oceanographic Museum, French oceanographer Jean Jaubert, took legal action against accusations in 1997 of the accidental release of Caulerpa taxifolia. On three occasions, in 1998, 2000 and 2001, French courts awarded him damages for defamation. The writer of this website has no idea where Caulerpa taxifolia came from and does not mean to imply that the Museum, any of its staff, or Wilhelmina Zoo, or any of its staff, played any part in spreading the "killer algae".

Further reading: Wikipedia: Caulerpa taxifolia