Hello everyone! I’m very sad to say that this is my last Specimen of the Week post because my internship finishes at the end of July. My final specimen is a carrion crow, and it was collected from a road on the Isle of Anglesey, Wales in 1993, and then donated to us in 2008 by the Museum of London. The purpose of the donation was “to fill a gap in the bird teaching material”. Read on to find out more about this magnificent bird…

Taxidermy carrion crow, Corvus corone LDUCZ-Y1533

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Taxidermy chicken (LDUCZ-Y1751)

Hello Specimen of the Week readers, Dean Veall here. This week I have chosen a specimen that is a newly acquired piece of taxidermy which features in our latest blockbuster exhibition The Museum of Ordinary Animals which opened this week. It’s an animal that has a staggering population of 19 billion individuals, Specimen of the Week 309 is the….. (more…)

Specimen of the week this week is big, very shiny and in need of some TLC. Today we bring you the…

LDUCZ-X1580 hawksbill turtle Eretmochelys imbricata

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Taxidermy elephant shrew in need of treatment.

This week the Grant Museum is launching a project to conserve our important collection of historic taxidermy, which involves taking these much-loved specimens off display to be treated. In their place, we will be filling the gaps with toy stuffed animals to raise awareness of the project.

The specimens have been on display for over a century, and in that time some of them have begun to split and crack, their filling may be poking out or they are just plain dirty. They require expert museum conservators to repair them, ensuring that they will survive for the long-term future. That is the key aim of this project: Fluff It Up: Make Taxidermy Great Again. (more…)

You do not have to be an expert zoologist to know that this is not what an owl looks like.

Next week we launch a major conservation project called Fluff It Up: Make Taxidermy Great Again, to repair and restore our historic taxidermy collection (check back on the blog on Monday for more about that). This will involve the expert conservation of specimens that have become damaged over their decades or centuries on display. In planning this project, we were faced with the decision of whether to “correct” the absurd but amusing eyes on this owl…

Long eared owl. Should we replace his eyes? LDUCZ-Y1604

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Hello Specimen of the Week fans, Dean Veall here. This week I’ve chosen a specimen I have often got confused by at this time of the year.  This week’s Specimen of the Week is…

Taxidermy swift LDUCZ-Y1552

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Taxidermy Bosc monitor lizard. LDUCZ-X1314

Taxidermy appears to being going through a period of popularity at the moment. Hipsters and fans of geek-chic have realised what many of us already knew – natural history is cool. Gastro-pubs and boutique coffee shops are widely using it as decoration (I wonder whether they know that it’s probably been covered in arsenic to stop it being eaten by moths and beetles – not the best things to have around food and drink), there are excellent museum installations exploring it, and there are taxidermy classes being offered all over the place. However, some of it is truly awful (perhaps that’s part of the charm?), including this week’s Specimen of the Week… (more…)

Hello zoo-fans. Will Richard here, throwing words at the page to bring you this specimen of the week. And what a specimen I’ve chosen. Graceful, elegant, deadly and now stuffed. Slightly wonkily. Case 17’s finest…

LDUCZ-Y1549 female sparrowhawk taxidermy

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Hello! It’s Will Richard here again, riding the blog flume that is Specimen of the Week. Last month I gave you an old man with a hole in his head, a family feud and the death of one of our closest cousins. Fun times… So this month I thought I’d have a look at something a little more optimistic. Something full of the promise of spring. A true story of hope, kindness and togetherness… at least that’s how I see it.

This week’s specimen of the week is…

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Many different animals are associated with Christmastime. There are those with a biblical connection to the birth of Jesus –the animals of the nativity (donkey, ox and sheep) and the camels ridden by the three kings/wise men. There is the Yule goat of Scandinavia (whose ancient origin is connected to the Norse god Thor who rode a chariot drawn by two goats). There are the partridges, turtle doves, French hens, calling birds, geese-a-laying and swans-a-swimming that are mentioned in seasonal song. Of course there are also the reindeer, doves, robins, and wrens associated with yuletide joy, happiness, good fortune, peace and love.

So without much further ado, let me just add my own animal choice into the mix….this week’s specimen of the week is…

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