As far as museum exhibits go, the Grant Museum‘s new(ish) Micrarium has taken the top place of honour on my list. It’s a wickedly wonderful place for the ‘tiny things’ that are my favourite things: the invertebrates that constitute an approximate 95% of all animal species. You won’t get that feeling if you walk into most, if not all, natural history museums. Vertebrates, especially large, charismatic, or extinct species, are grossly over-represented. Galleries of imposing dino skeletons, taxidermied mammals, birds with their wings of glory outstretched, life-sized models of Komodo dragons – that’s how to best inspire awe… right?
The dedicated museum display for microscopic specimens is thought to the be the first of its kind
The Grant Museum thinks that the little stuff can amaze too; it’s all a matter of creative presentation. They have arranged more than 2300 hand-picked, back-lit microscope slides very attractively within a former office space, creating the impression of a futuristic sci-fi time warp wardrobe that hurls you a few decades backwards, back to the days when images of histology specimens were projected onto lecture screens in anatomy and paleobiology classes. Not all the slides are dated, but the earliest ones I found were from the 1920s; most date between 1940 and 1960. They’re not all invertebrates though, as there are also sliced bits and blobs of vertebrate animals (entire developing baby newts, reptile feet, a cat paw, and even mammoth hair!).
A zoomed-out take of the Micrarium, which incidentally creates the feeling of zooming-in
While there I overheard a number of conversations which convey just how successful the new permanent exhibit is in capturing the curiosity and wonderment of adult and children alike. In addition to being quite insightful (these selected ones are typical of the many responses I heard), they’re highly entertaining to witness.
Boy: ‘Mummy, what’s a newt?’
Mum: ‘It’s a type of lizard… that lives in the water.’
Boy: ‘Oh, it does look like a lizard!’
(And me squirming in the corner, suppressing an overwhelming urge to correct the grave classification error but not wanting to embarrass the mother. I didn’t say anything. I’m still squirming – largely because I didn’t say anything.)
Woman 1: This is amazing, isn’t it? If only I knew what this is.
Woman 2: It’s all in Latin. I used to know these things, a long, long time ago.
Woman 1: Yeah, but that’s Latin as in the proper language, not Latin science names, isn’t it?
Woman 2: Well, if you knew Latin, that might give you a clue what these are.
(Hmm. Taking the Ephemeroptera for example, which loosely means ‘short-lived’- whatever will they make of that? Or Diptera – ‘two wings’. Not very helpful.)
Boy: ‘Mummy! What’s this?’
Mum: ‘Hmm, it says diptera. Looks like a fly of some sort.’
Boy: ‘What about this?’
Mum: ‘Blastomere embryo of a… something.’
Boy: ‘What’s a blastomere?’
Mum: ‘Part of an embryo? I have no idea.’
Boy: ‘Mummy! Mummy! Is this a slug?’
Mum: ‘No, dear, that’s a leech. A type of worm that sucks your blood.’
Boy: ‘Ewww. Like a mosquito?’
Mum: ‘Yes, like a mosquito.’
Boy: ‘Does it hurt?’
Mum: ‘I don’t know, but you can ask grandpa. He used to go fishing in rivers full of leeches, as he used to say.’
Boy: ‘Mummy! What…’
Mum: ‘Seriously Ben, there are two thousand slides in here. You’re not going to ask me what every single one of them is, are you?’
Boy: ‘You wouldn’t know anyway!’
Mum: ‘Why don’t you become a scientist when you grow up, and you tell me what all these are?’
(After a while, as an obliging ‘scientist’, I did step in to offer them what I knew of the animals on the slides.)
Mum: ‘Wow. Wow.’
Girl: ‘Wow.’
Mum: ‘Wow. You know who would really love to see this?’
Girl: ‘Who?’
Mum: ‘Your pops. You should go get him.’
Girl (runs off, yelling): ‘DAAAAAAAAAAAADD!’
Alas, there are no identification guides or interpretive signages. Perhaps, in time, the Museum might install a simple taxonomic guide highlighting the more popular groups? They make use of interactive iPads for other exhibits so it may be possible to have one with a simple app that translates binomial nomenclature into the vernacular.
Oh, and I am proud yet embarrassed to admit (natural scientist geek level = moderately high) that I could readily identify what I was looking at in most cases, even those without a recognisable body form, for those with labels. Heteroptera or true bugs, Isoptera or termites, Acari or mites and ticks, Plecoptera or stoneflies, Ephemeroptera or mayflies… they’re all the same to me. My entomologist former-supervisor would be well pleased.
Each slide is a work of art onto itself (that’s a sucking louse in the middle)
A slide of a parent freshwater leech with young was described by Grant Museum curator Mark Carnall as the ‘saddest microscope slide ever‘. Mark’s images of it, though hilariously captioned, resemble a weeping half-peeled banana, so it didn’t really get to me until I saw the actual slide. Unfortunately, any feelings of commiseration were quickly replaced by the replay in my mind of a scene from one of my favourite comedies. It wasn’t entirely random, you see, as it was also about a slimey clinging invertebrate:
Baldrick (attempting to impersonate Charlie Chaplin): ‘Well, I was hoping to persuade the slug to cling on, sir.’
Blackadder: ‘Baldrick, the slug is dead. If it failed to cling on to life, I see
no reason that it should cling on to your upper lip.’
Les Lamentable Leeches
I spent more than an hour ogling at the specimens. I could go back to stare at them every day – they are so beautiful. The slices are said to be a tenth of a millimetre thick (!) so you can imagine the patience, the deftness of hand and the skill required to prepare them. Astounding.
That cross-section slice of an orb-web spider is simply stunning
Lacking a step stool, the upper displays are out of my reach, but one day, one day I just might very well ask the friendly staff there for a chair.