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Specimen of the Week 344: The mata mata skeleton

By ucwehlc, on 25 May 2018

This week we are meeting one of the weirder-looking species at the Grant Museum, and that’s really saying something. In life it had a nose like a snorkel, a shell like tree bark and a neck longer than its body. Specimen of the week is…

Mata mata skeleton Chelus fimbriata LDUCZ X186

Mata mata skeleton Chelus fimbriata LDUCZ-X187

 

**The mata mata skeleton**

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Specimen of the Week 296: Hawksbill turtle taxidermy

By ucwehlc, on 16 June 2017

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

LDUCZ-X1580 hawksbill turtle Eretmochelys imbricata

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Why Twitter is good for museums – making discoveries

By Jack Ashby, on 9 April 2014

Using Twitter as a way of building a community of support, engaging people in content and shedding light on life behind the scenes in museums (that we don’t just dust stuff) is too obviously demonstrated by the real world to be spending too much time discussing. Not to mention the power to market events and exhibitions quickly and cheaply – assuming don’t over-use social media as a marketing tool.

On Monday I conducted two pieces of “research” on our collection which sprung up out of the blue and would have been very difficult to solve without turning to our Twitter followers to tap their collective brain to find a quick answer. Both of them were on specimens that begin with “H” and end with “Bill”. Weird.

Tweeting Turtles

Hawksbill turtle showing his interesting eyes LDUCZ-X1177

Hawksbill turtle showing his interesting eyes LDUCZ-X1177

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