The University of Michigan Natural History Museum

So as I said in my last post, I went to the University of Michigan Natural History Museum today. It has been a while since I was there last and I've been meaning to go for a while. It's a pretty neat place although it is a little on the small side. They have a pretty good section dealing with the wildlife of Michigan though.

The first floor of the museum is dedicated to the the pre-historic era. They have a couple of full dinosaur skeletons although those were hard to get pictures of as the lighting wasn't the greatest on them. The head above is from a Tyranosaurus Rex.

The skeleton of an ancestor to a wolf.

I don't remember what this was a skeleton to but they had the full skeleton and it looked like it was still in the ground.

One of the dinosaurs with the huge fin on their back.

An ancestor to the velociraptor. It is called the deinonychus and preceded the velociraptor by about 75 million years. It's not much taller than a person but still pretty nasty.

I really like this picture, the skull contrasted against the background.

This comes from a display where they showed how you can re-create the look of a dinosaur.

The picture above comes from what they called a curiosity cabinet. I believe it is some form of owl.

It wouldn't be a museum of natural history from the University of Michigan without a stuffed wolverine. Although there haven't been too many wolverines in the state of Michigan, we are called the Wolverine State and the University of Michigan teams are called the Wolverines. I've posted enough pictures of living wolverines here that I don't need to go into much detail on this one.

I can never get a picture of one of these in the wild. They are either too far away when I see them or by the time I get my camera ready they are gone. This is a wild turkey. The taxidermists at the museum do a pretty good job with the animals and they look pretty lifelike.

Another animal I can never catch in the wild, a kirtland warbler. They only live in a few places in Michigan and are close to threatened.

A pair of baltimore orioles.

A map turtle. I don't think I've ever seen one of these in the wild and I look at quite a few turtles.

I have gotten a picture of one of these in the wild but it was pretty tough. This is a cardinal.

Another bird that I've seen but can never quite get a picture of...the blue jay.

A snow owl.

An animal I would like to see but I don't think I ever will...a gray wolf.

The mascot of the University of Wisconsin...the badger.

A peregrine falcon. I'm not sure if this is one of the falcons I've gotten pictures of or not. It looks very similar to a falcon from a couple weeks ago.

A bird that I've gotten several pictures of, the bald eagle.

I believe this is gypsum crystals. It is used in chalk and other materials. There is quite a bit of it in Michigan.

All in all, I found the museum to be pretty interesting although it was a bit on the small side. I guess this is one of the advantages of living pretty close to a major university there are quite a few things like this.