Expensive and challenging

Press, 13 December 1985, Page 18

Expensive and challenging

By

GEOFFREY TUNNICLIFFE

The Canterbury Museum’s mammal exhibits are probably among the most impressive in New Zealand. The presentation of the diverse assembly of mammal species was a major ment; the mind boggles at the effort that has gone into obtaining, restoring, preparing, and displaying the 79 species represented. The Hall of Biology, the gallery near the museum’s main entrance where the mammals are exhibited, has been open to the public for 22 years. Its main function is to demonstrate the immense variety of living mammals, an appropriate topic to cover in view of New Zealand’s impoverished land-dwell-ing native mammalian fauna. Only two “Terrestrial” native mammals occur here — the long and shorttailed bats.

Of the 19 major groups or orders of mammals living in the world, 17 are featured in the museum. Representatives from 16 orders are displayed in the Hall of Biology; it therefore provides an excellent opportunity for visitors to get acquainted with one of the most interesting groups of vertebrates. Over the years hundreds of thousands of adults must have enjoyed their children’s enthusiastic reactions to the “stuffed,” or to use the more preferred term, mounted, mammals. Their “discovery” of

creatures that they may have previously seen only in a picture book or on television demonstrates the hall’s use as a real entertainment experience. The hall, however, also plays an important role in higher education as it provides excellent opportunities to scrutinise the external structures of mammals, which sheds insight into their lifestyles and therefore some aspects of their evolution. It may be argued that natural history exhibits at museums run a poor second to the marvellous opportunities there are for studying live animals in zoos. Almost threequarters of the mammals displayed at the museum, however, are rarely if ever held in zoos. Many mammals do not acclimatise well to captivity, while others are too secretive, or nocturnal, and as a Consequence are unsuitable as live exhibits.

One common question visitors ask when taken on guided tours of a natural history gallery is the value of a mounted mammal. The cost of preparing a creature the size of an elephant, according to two recent quotes from taxidermists, would be in the vicinity of $48,000; a smaller mammal, like, a rat, would be from $2OO to $3OO. Based on current taxidermy costs, the value of the hall’s 94 mounts

would be approximately $121,000. There are other costs too; the display cases and associated fittings such as lighting and the salaries of the curators and display staff whose task it is to organise the presentation of specimens; the museum’s historical records show that the Hall of Biology took three years to complete. The assembly and maintenance of natural history displays, especially dioramas (a pictorial representation of a natural scene), provides an immense challenge to museum staff. New research requires that the texts on the labels which accompany the specimens

have to be regularly updated; the display cases too must be kept under constant surveillance to ensure that they are free from insects or rodents — rats and mice — both of which can cause a lot of damage to biological material in a very short time.

The visiting public find it a challenge to check the accuracy of the museum’s displays. Recently, for example, an Australian naturalist made an interesting observation in relation to the museum’s koala bear exhibit. Apparently koalas always move down trees bottom first. Our specimen conveys the impression that koalas climb down head first!