There were a lot of owl specimens on display at the museum. Primarily, I enjoyed it for the ability to compare the sizes between the species I haven't seen in person yet.
Also, while I prefer animals to be alive, these allow me to get much closer than would typically be possible.
With that said, taxidermy seems to have come a very long way over the years.
This Great Horned Owl hunting a skunk was a beautiful twilight diarama that almost looks alive. I took about a dozen pictures of it even though they all came out the same. It was an amazing work, and again, I'd prefer my owls and skunks alive, but this was beautiful for preserved specimens.
Here's just the owl itself:
While this display scores a 10/10, others were a bit less accurate to what I hope they looked like when they were alive. Let's review the others and see how others have done in their attempts to preserve these animals.
Note: Didn't realize just how many there were here until now! My fingers are tired! 😵💫
Hey, this is near me. I should go, if not just for the stuffed toy ookpik.
You should! I think it was almost as good as the Smithsonian! The dinosaurs here are amazing.
The National Aviary and the owl bathroom at The Zenith I posted are all there too. You could do all 3 in a day if you wanted. If you had 2 days, is add the Phipps Conservatory as well if you like plants too.
I got married at the Aviary! Love that place, we're definitely due for another visit. Phipps is also really cool even though I'm not really a plant person.
Oh, very cool! I'm picturing a penguin ring bearer! 😁
The people we stayed with got married at Phipps.