Category:Fauna

Living, or Apparently Once Living, Specimens

The boundaries between Zoology and Botany once seemed so clear. I'm afraid its not so easy any more. Zoology is the study of living organisms not categorized as plants. Botany has traditionally studied organisms that were not considered to be animals. Some of these organisms are no longer considered to be part of the plant kingdom however—these include fungi (mycology), lichens (lichenology), bacteria (bacteriology), viruses (virology) and single-celled algae, which are now grouped as part of the Protista.

Taxidermy

Label from the Robert Hull Fleming Museum, Burlington, Vermont]]

Items Made From Animals, or Animal Parts, Case C

In contemporary motion pictures is often seen the reassuring warning: “no animals were harmed in the making of this film.” No such enlightened viewpoints are prevalent in this section of our exhibit. Who can say the manner in which any of these—somewhat gruesome—trophies were taken? However, in traditional cultures, there is often deep reverence shown for animals as the suppliers of food, clothing, and transportation. There is certainly great reverence in the curators’ choice of these artifacts, selected from a wide range of cultures for study. They are objects of wonder.

Taxidermy has become much less toxic today. 19th century methods frequently utilized arsenic and were considerably less benign. Here is a description from 1910-11: “Like all arsenical preparations, this is exceedingly dangerous in the hands of unskilled persons, often causing shortness of breath, sores, brittleness of the nails and other symptoms; and, as arsenic is really no protection against the attacks of insects, an efficient substitute has been invented by Browne… Solutions of corrosive sublimate, often recommended, are even if efficient, dangerous in the extreme.”

Nowadays, there are even coraspondance schools for taxidermy.

Fauna at the Main Street Museum

The Flora and Fauna collections represent invasive species from the infrastructure of an economically marginal Vermont downtown. Our dried cats are not true mummies; they are merely dehydrated. Our local collections of knotweed, dogweed and loosestrife (Lythrum salicaria) are presented alongside historic and geographically significant specimens representing the various cultures of the earth. Paving stones from Rome and cobblestones from our local railroad underpass are preserved here as well as asphalt from Los Angeles, New Orleans and Baltimore. Coffee cups and aspirin bottles from now defunct work places in White River Jct. are displayed alongside bricks from Monticello, masonry from the Alamo in Texas (and the Forteleza in San Juan), and dried rose specimens (family Rosaceae) from Robert Todd Lincoln’s—and camillias from Jefferson Davis’s—houses.