A North Wales aquarium’s search for a mermaid has attracted the attention of TV and Hollywood stars.

A professional American mermaid and a representative for Daryl Hannah from the iconic movie Splash!  have both got in touch with Rhyl’s SeaQuarium about their unusual job offer.

The aquarium is looking for its very own resident mermaid to swim with some of the sharks, rays and conger eels in their ocean tunnel tank.

Californian-based Linden Wolbert has already registered her interest in the job which will involve wearing a specially made costume and engaging with visitors while hand-feeding many of the fish on display.

Linden travels around the world working as a real-life mer-girl and appears regularly in television programmes, commercials and music videos.

She contacted the SeaQuarium in Rhyl, after hearing about their advert in the UK’s DIVE magazine for a professional mermaid .

The trained freediver can hold her breath for around five minutes and has a custom made prosthetic tail built by a Hollywood special effects artist.

“I am curious what the going rate is for this fintastic mermaid gig, and am all gills to hear more!” she said to the Rhyl aquarium, on the north-east coast of Wales.

But she wasn’t the only star to be interested in the job’s de”tails”, which require anyone applying must be a qualified PADI scuba-diver..

A representative for Daryl Hannah, who starred as a mermaid alongside Tom Hanks in the classic 80s romantic-comedy Splash!, contacted the SeaQuarium to explain that as a PADI certified diver she certainly had all the necessary qualifications.

Unfortunately though the famous actress, who is a keen campaigner on environmental issues, may struggle to fit any North Wales mermaid duties into her diary.

The SeaQuarium’s displays manager, Paul Tyson said he would be delighted to have the Holywood star or Linden Wolbert as the aquarium’s professional mermaid.

“They’d face some pretty tough competition though as we’ve been inundated with requests,” said Paul.

“So far we’ve had interest from all sorts of people – students, marine biologists, professional divers, paintball marshals, the lot.

“And we’ve not just had people from all over the UK apply but from all over the world.”

“We’d like some more male applicants though, as we don’t mind if it’s a mer-man or a mer-girl that gets the job” Paul said.

The mermaid’s duties at the Rhyl aquarium won’t all be glamorous though.

“It’s not all going to be about sitting around looking good – as a qualified diver our mermaid will have to help out with cleaning some of the 50 square metres of glass that make-up the inside of our ocean eco-system tank,” Paul added.

For more information or to apply to become the SeaQuarium’s mermaid get in-touch with Paul by emailing paul.tyson@seaquarium.co.uk .

Applicants need to be available during next year’s Easter holidays, be enthusiastic about marine life as well as being scuba-dive qualified to PADI – Professional Association of Diving Instructors – open water standard.

Closing date for initial enquiries is November 5, 2010.