Behind the scenes: Canadian Museum Of Nature
4:41PM, October 07, 2008 - [ Permalink]
Last week, friends of mine, Mel & Martin, knowing what a huge museum geek I am, invited me (and Tracey) to come with them on a private tour of the Museum of Nature's Natural Heritage Building - their workshops and storage facility.
The building itself is in Hull, a short drive away from our place. Once there, we were introduced to some of the folks who work for the museum, Kieran, Jennifer and another lady whose name I have unfortunately forgotten.
I cleverly wore my "Never Forget" tshirt, which the paleontologist thought was funny, however, I was in such awe of the collection, I completely didn't think of getting a photo of be beside some of the specimens until we were driving home.
The tour started with the walking through a records room, with a few small samples and, notably, a yellow Lego triceratops. From there, the tour began in minerals and dinosaurs, a large room filled with rows and rows of shelves filled with catalogued specimens.
As we moved through the collection, I recognized various pieces that used to be on display in the museum, including a huge cross section of a tree trunk that used to be on the fourth floor.
We were shown how many bones were still in the original packing from when they were dug up, some dating back into the early 1910's. Also in this particular isle was a previously lost skeleton - it had been lent out many years ago, and then, lost. Eventually, it was found in a trailer and returned to the museum.
To be completely honest, they could have just left me in this room and I would have giddily kept myself busy looking at bones and rocks for the rest of the day, however, the tour moved on.
We moved into a somewhat cooler room, that contained many of the specimens from the ice age exhibit we saw when Tracey and I went to the museum at the end of our summer vacation.
We then moved into the botany collection - another large room full of sealable storage cabinets that contained dried specimens, which Jennifer told us, once included a plastic flower collected on the shore of Hudson's bay (and stored as a deferred joke, I suspect). She also showed us some very old field journals and talked about protecting the collection over time (acid free paper, temperature and humidity controls, etc).
Next, we moved on to the lab where specimens that are stored in formaldehyde or alcohol are processed. The room is heavily ventilated (read: loud), *everything* is grounded, and equipped to handle containers large enough to hold a shark. There were what appeared to be small lampreys, and a few creatures I couldn't readily identify. The technician spoke about the process of keeping the samples safe, dealing with evaporation, and simple solutions they have come up with for various problems.
The next room had a collection of mounted skeletons in one corner, the walls were *covered* in antlers from various animals (that must be chore to organize, I'm certain), more rows and rows of shelves storing everything from giant turtle shells, narwhal tusks, and other water-borne creatures. Along the wall there were two mounted whale skulls - intellectually, I knew whales were big, but seeing them in person really gave me a clear idea as to the scale.
The room also contains some bones and vertebrae of the blue whale that will be mounted in the Museum of Nature when the renovations are completed. Amusingly, the palentologists have been tasked with assembling the whale skeleton, as they've had lots of practice.
Also worth noting was that one of the ribs was oozing whale oil - the bones need to be treated to remove the oil, otherwise the mounted skeletons would be rather messy.
We then moved on to the insect collection (they were out, unfortunately), and then we spoke with Andre (hope I got that correct), who is a mollusk expert. I know, I know; I thought the same thing - but after chatting with him for half an hour, I was keenly reminded why everything in the world is so fascinating.
Our final stop was a smelly room where the blue whale skull (that will be mounted) was being treated to remove the previously mentioned oils. *Holy crap is it huge*. The skull and jaw are in a "tub" that is large enough to hold our car.
We finished, returned to the lobby, thanked everyone profusely and drove home. The staff was wonderful at answering everyone's questions and very tolerant of my taking photos - I would truly love to go back and spend more time going through the collections.
More of my photos from the trip can be found in this Flickr Set.
