Behind the Scenes: Creating the Nature Museum Collection

Lauma Miķelsone-Šibeika, head of the working group of the Nature Museum exhibition “The path of a natural object to the museum collection”, shows fossils at one of the stands of the new exhibition. The collection of the museum has a total of around 230,000 different items. These are minerals, fossils, plants, mushrooms, birds, mammals, molluscs and many other items, which are provided by the museum specialists themselves. This collection is mostly collected in the wild, and sometimes the museum receives objects seized by customs.

“If in other history museums and memorial museums it is the case that most of the items are donated, bought in various ways or found archaeologically, etc., then our museum has the peculiarity that we collect a large part of these items from nature ourselves.

After that, we process it specially, because each thing has its own algorithm, how it can be done, and then we store it in the right conditions – in cabinets, on shelves, at certain temperatures, in humidity regimes, so that the thing can be preserved as long as possible. And then we can also use it for science, research, public education and other purposes,” said Miķelsone-Šibeika.

In the newly created exhibition, you can also see the ways of storing the stock, cabinets and preparations. The museum also invites you to take a look behind the scenes of collecting the collection and explore the inventory of specialists – various insect catching nets and traps, magnifying glasses, geologist’s drills, field notebooks, long rubber boots, mushroom knives and even a boat. Miķelsone-Šibeika is the head of the Department of Botany and Mycology and shows the working tools of mycologists on display.

“For example, if the mushroom picker goes with a kitchen knife, then the mycologist has a special knife with a brush so that we can clean this fungus. If the mushroom picker goes to the forest and observes with his eyes, then the mycologist often also uses special lighting – ultraviolet light, because there are mushrooms that react to ultraviolet light. Then you can see them even when you walk in the dark – she reflects. Well, so that we can see what is in the water, and to find exactly what we are interested in, we use aquascopes. Snail researchers use special sieves and scrapers with which we can get aquatic organisms out of the ground. Also useful things in the farm, so that we can dig out what is there from the bottom. Our equipment can also be quite ordinary things.

A special place in the exhibition is also reserved for taxidermy, or stuffed animals. Both modern and historical collection items are exhibited here, such as the taxidermy sculpture of an elk exhibited in the Museum of Nature for 100 years and the “school of mice” created in the 1970s.

“We have such a flashback from history to the present, because in this taxidermy showcase we can see a ‘school of mice’, which may have remained in the minds of many museum visitors from childhood. It is an example of anthropomorphic taxidermy, and it is when animals were given a human image and different scenes of life were created using animals. And this is a historical way, but nowadays it is no longer done like this, because they stick to what is characteristic of each species in nature,” said Mikelsone-Šibeika.

Since the museum’s collection contains many species that are disappearing in Latvia and the world, as well as new species in the fauna and flora of Latvia, the value of the collections grows over the years and the question of their long-term preservation becomes more and more relevant.

The exhibition also tells about how the various objects are processed so that they can be stored for a long time. Mushroom dryers, plant press, microscopes and other tools are on display. The senior entomologist of the Nature Museum, Ugis Piterāns, gives a glimpse into his work process after the insects have already been caught in the wild.

“Depending, of course, on what each researcher is studying, the methods can be different. But here, for example, plating. When flying insects are plated, it is usually done with special plating tables. We expand the wings and also try to get a certain aesthetic, because stocking is not only to preserve the specimens themselves, but also to make them visually attractive. Since insects are small, in many cases that work is very delicate. Of course, the researcher’s hands get used to this scale, but the insects can be big. Here, for example, we are talking about millimeters and often even less.

When collecting the mentioned samples, museum specialists also make special notes about the environment in which a certain mushroom, plant or insect was found, which also allows to determine various changes in the communities of specific plants or animals over a longer period of time.

“The point of these collections in general is that in many cases, in order for us to manage wisely in nature, fields or forests, we need some kind of knowledge about where a species lives. And often this basic knowledge is provided by these collections – to show that, yes, this species is often found or is really very rare, or lives in very specific conditions. And then we should take care not to accidentally destroy these special places. In many museums that have been around for much longer, but also ours in the museum, there are specimens that are over a hundred years old, even 120 years old. This is also our goal, which we are currently doing, so that it is preserved for future generations as evidence of the species that currently live in Latvia. Already, thanks to climate change, new species appear, and we are witnessing which species will appear and leave it for future generations,” said the museum’s senior entomologist.

The Nature Museum exhibition “The path of a natural object to the museum’s collection” will be on view until May 17.