L.A. Natural History Museum

The L.A. natural history museum is quite small, particularly when compared to the British one, but it was good all the same. There was a butterfly pavilion when we went with lots of species native to the US as well as some exotics.

This is a Spicebush swallowtail (Pterourus troilus):

And this is a Julia (Dryas iulia):

The museum focused on north american species, as you might expect for a county museum. They had a great exhibition showing the work occurring on a T. rex fossil that is being prepared for display. My favourite piece, however, was not part of a gallery or exhibition at all, it was in one of the entrance halls. It was an oarfish (Regalecus sp.). It was found floating off Catalina island in the late '70s nearly dead.


It's a huge fish and the species is thought to be the source of stories of sea serpents. They're beautifully coloured when alive but preservation causes them to become dull. The most interesting thing to me was the shape of the pelvic fins which were long and thin with a rounded end, a bit like a peacock's eye feather.

I really enjoyed the museum and would recommend going just for the oarfish!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Sexism vs cultural imperialism

Image
As I was getting ready for bed last night a friend shared a tweet that immediately caught my attention. https://twitter.com/sbattrawden/status/1143465003409915905 The tweet was of a paper that has just been published online, titled "Does physician gender have a significant impact on first-pass success rate of emergency endotracheal intubation?" and showed the abstract which began, It is unknown whether female physicians can perform equivalently to male physicians with respect to emergency procedures. Understandably, this got the backs up of a lot of people, myself included. Who on earth thinks that's a valid question to be researching in this day and age? Are we really still having to battle assumptions of female inferiority when it comes to things like this? Who on earth gave this ethics approval, let alone got it though peer review? I then took a deep breath and asked myself why a respected journal, The American Journal of Emergency Medicine , would publish
Read more

The remarkable tree lobster

Image
I can’t remember the first time I heard about the Lord Howe Island stick insect, and I can’t say my interest has been much more than in passing. They would pique my interest when I saw them in the news, only to fade back into the vast and ever growing pile of ‘oh, interesting’. Then, at the beginning of November, I actually got to come face to face with one of these creatures and it was so incredible I decided to find out more. This is what I’ve learned… Lord Howe Island stick insects are - I’m sure you’ll be surprised to learn - found on Lord Howe Island. This is a small crescent-shaped island in the Tasman Sea between Australia and New Zealand. I didn’t realise until researching this piece that the island is actually inhabited. It has a population of 382 people according to the 2011 census . The Lord Howe Island stick insect ( Dryococelus australis ), or LHISI as it’s known to friends, was first described by Xavier Montrouzier in 1855 from specimens collected by the HMS Hera
Read more

Gutting the DSA with dodgy statistics

A couple of days ago the Rt Hon. David Willetts MP (Minister for Universities and Science) announced his changes to the Disabled Students’ Allowance. The DSA is a grant given to disabled students to help cover costs that arise as a direct result of their disability. It's an excellent scheme and for many it can, and has, make the difference between success and failure. These 'changes', more accurately termed 'cuts', are far-reaching and devastating. 
Read more