Tanks for the memories

A new date looms large on the New England cultural calendar, and Natalie Laroche isn't happy about it. Yesterday, arms flapping up and down in protest, the 3-year-old ran circles around a wooden bench at the New England Aquarium, lamenting the inexorable approach of the day the sea lions will go away.

Nov. 28 is the last day the sea lions will take their watery stage at the aquarium, officials announced yesterday. Come mid-January, trainers will usher Zuma and Tyler into special crates and ship them off to Chicago's Shedd Aquarium, at least until 2006. The remainder of the New England Aquarium's sea lion lineup, Ballou and Guthrie, will be sent to another aquarium to be determined later.

The large sea mammals are being moved to make room for construction of a new sea lion exhibit to replace the aging old barge on the harbor known as the Discovery, where for a decade the slick-swimming quartet has entertained children and adults alike with their roaring, diving, herring-gobbling, and basketball-balancing. The children's reaction was predictable.

''Zuuuumaaaa!" Natalie wailed. ''I feel sad."

''I'll miss them doing their tricks and stuff," said Justin Abramowicz, 7, who was just as disconsolate as Natalie, as he clutched his uncle Tom Barren's hand for support.

Aquarium staff made the decision so that they can sell the 1974 Discovery and build a new open-air, more naturalistic sea lion center, for approximately $3.5 million. Fund-raising is underway and ''gaining momentum," Billy Spitzer, the aquarium's vice president of programs and exhibits, told employees over pizza and mammalian roars in the barge.

The new home's completion date will depend on fund-raising, Spitzer said. When finished, the new sea lion site will probably include nooks and crannies where trainers can hide fish for the animals to find, a gazebo roof, and more space for the sea lions to bask. One proposal calls for shallow pools to allow visitors to splash around with the sea lions, Spitzer said.

''This is a really exciting opportunity for us to experiment with a different type of exhibit, one that is less 'show' and more intimate," Spitzer said. The Discovery is a hulking, mostly windowless ship made of metal that transfers pinging noises into the tank that the seal lions find bothersome, he said. By contemporary standards for marine mammals, the ship is considered poor living conditions.

Yesterday, the sea lions put on their show as always, swimming slow, lazy circles; kissing visitors on the cheek; and sparking shrieks of delight from children.

In mid-January, crates carrying Tyler, 21, and Zuma, 14, will be hoisted onto a waiting truck and whisked to Logan Airport. Flying priority airfreight, they will be accompanied by at least one trainer and one veterinarian. No in-flight meals will be served. Jenny Montague, a veteran trainer, said the sea lions, like harried travelers of a higher mammalian order, are prone to upset stomachs.

Once in Chicago, ''the boys," as the sea lions are known to New England Aquarium staff, will move into a holding area where they can acclimate to their new home, the Pacific Northwest Coast exhibit at Shedd, the world's largest indoor marine mammal pavilion, replete with white-sided dolphins and beluga whales.

Zuma and Tyler were chosen for the voyage because they are more skittish than Guthrie and Ballou, trainers said.

Guthrie, 22, and Ballou, 14, will be moved to a temporary space with their smaller relatives, seals, in the New England Aquarium, and then moved to an as-yet undetermined location. Since they are more docile, staff decided that Guthrie and Ballou could handle two moves in one year.

Yesterday, aquarium staff gathered on the edge of the tank and posed for a photo with Guthrie. Many said that although they understood the need for the move, it did not make it any easier to accept emotionally.

In a brief address to staff, Edmund C. Toomey, aquarium president, tried to lighten the mood. He spoke of ''putting this day into context" and ''thinking about what is really important in terms of our strategic planning."

The sea lions declined repeated requests for comment, but there were signs some children were already moving on. ''Mom, come here!" shouted Lyndon Bohnert, 6. ''There's a snail!"