NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM, LONDON: A Few of Our Favorites

Diplodocus dinosaur skeleton in front of the Natural History Museum, London.

On our recent trip to London, the Natural History Museum was our first stop. The museum is enormous and you can’t possibly see it all in one visit. And even if you do have time, it is best to decide which things to focus on. Our main goal was to see the exhibit of the winners of the yearly photography competition—100 photos selected from more than 4000 entries. We also wanted to revisit some of our favorite parts of the museum.

Blue whale skeleton in Hintze Hall.

We walked to the museum from our hotel near the South Kensington tube stop and entered at the East Gate, where we followed a path through the Evolution Garden to get to the Central Entrance. The museum is free, but we had to line up to go through security. Once inside, the giant skylit space of Hintze Hall loomed before us, with a huge whale skeleton hanging overhead and a grand staircase leading up to a statue of Charles Darwin.

Art with Statue of Charles Darwin.

After paying our respects to Darwin, we stopped at the information booth to pick up a map and get directions to the photo exhibit. The map divides the museum into four color coded zones. We focused on the Green Zone which includes birds, the wildlife photographer of the year gallery, fossil marine reptiles, and treasures of the museum, where we saw the fossil skeleton of Archaeopteryx, the first bird.

Caroline with fossil of giant sea reptile collected by Mary Anning.

On our way to the photo exhibit we passed by the amazing display of fossil skeletons of giant marine reptiles, many of them collected by Mary Anning in the nineteenth century. During the Dinosaur Age the oceans teemed with these huge reptiles.

Wild Photographer of the Year Gallery.

The Wildlife Photographer of the Year photo exhibit requires a ticket, which we purchased at the entrance. Each photo in the exhibit was backlighted so that it glowed in the partially darkened room and was accompanied by a label with the title, photographer’s name and other pertinent information. What surprised me was not only the diversity of the subjects and locations where they were shot, but the variety of cameras—ranging from specially designed equipment to a simple iPhone.

Photo of moth camouflaged against tree bark--taken with an iPhone.

Having worked with photographers on many of my books, I know how hard it is to get just the right shot. I appreciated a quote mounted on one wall of the exhibit: It is vital to be patient and wait for the moment that completes the story you are trying to tell, even if it takes hours or days or weeks, or sometimes even years. (Akansha Sood Singh, natural history filmmaker)

Models of two dodos. Extinct since 1681 due to overhunting, habitat loss and predation by other animals.

The exit from the photo exhibit was through the museum gift shop where it was possible to buy postcards and books of the images in the exhibit. We then visited the bird room in search of the Archaeopteryx fossil but got sidetracked by a case full of birds that have gone extinct, including the dodo, which once lived on a remote island in the Indian Ocean. Although we found a cast of Archaeopteryx in the bird room, we learned that the actual fossil, one of the most valuable items in the museum’s collection, was upstairs in the room of treasures. So we trudged up the stairs to find it.\

Fossil of Archaeopteryx embedded in limestone. You can see impressions of feathers attached to the wings.

After viewing Archaeopteryx and the other museum treasures it was time to sit down and have some refreshments, which we did in the Central Café behind the stairwell on the main floor. We had seen many of our favorites and been inspired by the photo exhibit. We’ll come back another day to see more.

Main entrance to the Natural History Museum, London.

DINOSAURS, ROCKS, MINERALS AND MORE: Hands-On Science at the Pacific Museum of Earth at UBC, Vancouver, Canada

Amethyst crystals and Lambeosurus skeleton, Pacific Museum of Earth, UBC, Vancouver, Canada.

How do dinosaur fossils, rocks and minerals, petrified wood, climate and weather help us learn about the history of the Earth? The place to go to find out is the Pacific Museum of Earth in the Earth and Oceanic Science building at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada.

This small museum is filled with kid-friendly (and adult-friendly too) interactive exhibits—from touchable dinosaur bones and giant crystals, a 3-D “map” you can manipulate to change its contours, a machine that spins a tiny tornado, to a green screen that allows you to be your own weather forecaster and more. In an adjacent building you can find more fossils and a history of human evolution.

Dromaeosaurus albertensus

I visited the Pacific Museum of Earth in July when I spent several days in Vancouver. I discovered it by accident on a  walk across the UBC campus. When I spotted the dinosaur skeletons displayed in the main lobby of the Earth Sciences building, I couldn't resist going inside to find out more. 

A touch screen provided an introduction and questions to ask: From there signs pointed me to the next building (EOS) and the Pacific Museum of Earth.

Petrified redwood, 40-50 million years old. Collected and donated by Dr. P. B. Read.

Throughout the museum signs invite visitors to touch or to explore.

Kids recreating the landscape in this 3-D map display.

I saw kids intrigued by an exhibit about mapping and how contour lines indicate elevation. A large tray (similar to a sandbox) filled with granules could be rearranged to make a 3-D landscape. As the elevations changed, colored lights projected from above change to correspond with the new contours.

Solar system display in the gem room.

Gems.

In another room a variety of gems are displayed in lighted boxes, almost as if in a jewelry shop. Below each window a pull-out drawer contains information about the gems. In the center of the room hangs a large orb representing the solar system. Using the screen below, you can change its appearance--making it into the planet of your choice.

The Lytton Jelly Roll.

An amazing example of how rocks can "fold" fills one wall.

Femur (leg bone) of a hypacrosaur.

The museum is clearly designed to appeal to school age kids, showing them how cool earth science can be. Who knows, perhaps some of them will grow up to be earth scientists themselves one day.

A green screen a computer camera has turned me into a weather reporter.

MEETING A GIANT OF THE DINOSAUR AGE (Via Its Fossil Remains)

Giant Sea Reptiles of the Dinosaur Age. At the Royal Tyrell Museum, Drumheller, Alberta

In May 2023 I visited the Royal Tyrrell Museum in Drumheller, Canada, the most amazing display of dinosaur fossils I have ever seen. (See my blogpost, June 19, 2023, for more about the exhibits.) I was especially interested in the room containing the remains of Shonisaurus, the giant sea reptile that is the on the cover of my book Giant Sea Reptiles of the Dinosaur Age (Clarion Books, 2007.)

I love learning about dinosaurs and what the world was like when they were alive. My book, Giant Sea Reptiles of the Dinosaur Age, looks at the diversity of large reptiles that once inhabited the world’s oceans. Like the dinosaurs, they all became extinct 65 million years ago. We know about them today from their fossil remains.

Opening pages of Giant Sea Reptiles of the Dinosaur Age

On my recent trip to the Royal Tyrell Museum in Drumheller, Alberta, Canada I was thrilled to see up close the remains of Shonisaurus sikanniensis, the huge ichthyosaur that I wrote about in the opening pages of the book. It fills an entire room at the museum. Here's what I wrote:

Fossil skeleton of Shonisaurus sikanniensis.

Two hundred and twenty million years ago, in waters that covered what is now western Canada, a huge marine reptile cruised the shallow seas. Propelling itself with flat, flipper-like limbs, the 70-foot long animal hunted for shellfish and other small ocean animals, which it sucked into its long, toothless snout and swallowed. This fearsome creature was Shonisaurus sikanniensis, a species of ichthyosaur, one of several types of large sea reptiles that inhabited the world’s oceans in the Dinosaur Age.

The fossil remains of Shonisaurus sikanniensis were first discovered in 1991 when a hiker in northern British Columbia spotted some big fossil bones eroding out of the banks of the Sikanni Chief River. He reported his find to the Royal Tyrell Museum of Paleontology, in Drumheller, Alberta, where one of the curators, Dr. Elizabeth Nicholls, was an expert on prehistoric sea reptiles. She visited the site and was amazed by what she saw. The bones were bigger than those of any known marine reptile, and, incredibly, most of the skeleton was intact. The only missing parts were the hind limbs. Over the course of three summers, the fossil skeleton was dug out of the ground and transported to the museum, where it was studied and prepared for exhibit. Every part of the animal proved to be huge. The massive skull weighed more than one and a half tons, and the largest vertebrae, which measured nearly 11 inches across, were the size of dinner plates. In 2006, the giant skull of Shonisaurus sikanniensis went on display at the museum. Along with the rest of the skeleton, it will help answer questions about the appearance and lifestyle of this giant prehistoric predator and why it grew so big.

As Elizabeth Nicholls is quoted in the museum display: "The world we live in right now is just a blink in the history of life on our planet. 220 million years ago there was a tremendous diversity of life that we know so little about."

Giant Sea Reptiles of the Dinosaur Age is illustrated with beautiful detailed watercolor paintings by Laurie Caple. The book is no longer available in print, but you can look for it in your local library.  It will introduce you to some of the most amazing creatures that ever swam in the oceans the world.

At the Royal Tyrrell Museum, Drumheller, Alberta, Canada

 

 

THE ROYAL TYRELL MUSEUM, Drumheller, Alberta, Canada, a Prehistoric Treasure Trove

Royal Tyrell Museum, Drumheller, Alberta, Canada

In early May, Art and I were in Canada, landing in Calgary, then driving about an hour and a half across the Alberta wheat fields to the town of Drumheller, located in the Canadian Badlands, where some of the world’s most impressive dinosaur fossils have been found. Our goal was to visit the Royal Tyrell Museum of Paleontology, a treasure trove of fossils from the Dinosaur Age.

Dinosaur fossils at the Royal Tyrell Museum, Drumheller, Alberta, Canada

After buying our tickets at the museum entrance, we followed signs to the first room, which we found filled with life size models of dinosaurs and an introduction to life in Cretaceous Alberta. We felt as if we had stepped into another world.

Cretaceous Alberta. Seventy million years ago, eastern Alberta was warmer and wetter than it is today and was teeming with wildlife—dinosaurs of all sorts of shapes and sizes!

Dinosaurs lived from about 230 to 64 million years ago, during the Mesozoic Era.

A visit to the museum is a trip through time—3.9 billion years of evolution. 

While some skeletons are displayed in life-like poses, assembled as they would have been in the living animal---

Camarasaurus. The mounting of the skeletons in real-life poses recreates the drama of life in the past.

--or even as whole skeletons as they appeared when first discovered---

This T. rex skeleton is known as “black beauty". The bones became darkened by the element manganese during fossilization.

--it is more typical for fossil bones to be scattered, needing to be reassembled like a jigsaw puzzle.

A typical bonebed.

And not only are there fossils of dinosaurs at the museum, but also of plants, insects, fish, amphibians, birds, other reptiles.

Fossil impression of an early bird Confuciousornis sanctus (125-120 mya) from Liaoning Province China. Donated by the Chinese Academy of Science.

While most exhibits are just to look at, some invite participation. Standing next to this Camarasaurus hind limb, I look miniscule. In real life Camarasaurus grew to be 60 feet long and weighed 32 tons.

Camarasaurus right hind limb.

Albertosaurus sarcophagus hand--and my hand!

The remains of Borealopelta markmitchelli, found at a mine north of Fort McMurray, are of the best-preserved armored dinosaur in the world.  This dinosaur is named after Mark Mitchell, who worked on the specimen to prepare it for study and exhibit.  Analysis of pigments found with the skeleton suggest that the dinosaur was reddish-brown in real life.

Borealopelta markmitchelli

Most of the fossils on exhibit at the Tyrell Museum have been found in Canada, but some are from other places. A slab of fossilized ferns from a coal mine in Pennsylvania is mounted at the entrance to the Cretaceous Garden, a greenhouse with ferns, cycads, and other plants typical of the Dinosaur Age.

Ancient ferns preserved in coal.

Every day scientists are learning new things about dinosaurs. The large flat plates along the spine of Stegosaurus were probably used for display and species recognition, but traces of blood vessels suggest they may also have been used to help regulate body temperature.

Stegosaurus. This slow-moving, plant-eating dinosaur was about 20-25 feet long and weighed 2-5 tons.

 

Shonisaurus skeleton.

One whole room of the museum is devoted to the giant fossil of a sea reptile called Shonisaurus, the biggest and best-preserved giant sea reptile fossil ever found. I wrote about its discovery in my book Giant Sea Reptiles of the Dinosaur Age. It was a thrill to meet it in person--and to see all the other amazing fossils that fill the museum. (You can read more about Shonisaurus in a separate blog post at my Art and Books blog.)

The path through the museum winds its way through many rooms (including some on the second level) finally exiting through the gift shop. Among the many souvenirs for sale I was pleased to see a large selection of children's books about dinosaurs and the prehistoric world. We visited on a Saturday afternoon and the museum was filled with families of dinosaur enthusiasts. As we left the last room of the museum we were reminded of the importance of learning about the Earth's past:

Understanding ancient life and the circumstances in which it flourished or died, helps us recognize our place in nature, and how our decisions affect all life on Earth.

Royal Tyrell Museum seen from viewing platform.

During our visit we spent several hours in the museum, pausing for lunch in the museum cafeteria. We ate inside but on a warmer day one can sit on the patio overlooking a pond. At the end of the day, before going back to our car, we climbed the stairs to the top of the hill across from the museum for a panoramic view of the Red Deer River Valley. The next morning we returned for a hike around the Badlands Interpretive Trail and a visit to the hoodoos. (See my blog post of May 15, 2023.)

To plan a visit to the Royal Tyrell Museum of Paleontology, visit the museum website.

Daspletosaurus skull.