Staff had to cope with leaks from the roof of ‘The Dead Zoo’ during the pandemic

After the flood.

National Museum of Ireland – Natural History, Merrion Street, Dublin 2.

Paolo Viscardi, Curator of Zoology, writes:

At the Dead Zoo in Dublin the pandemic has thrown up different challenges. With a leaking roof threatening the national collections, a project to safeguard them by undertaking a roof refurbishment was considered a priority and categorised as essential work.

The first stage of this project was to remove two whales suspended from supports within the roofspace, which in turn required a substantial amount of preparation, given the crowded Victorian gallery space

In an ideal world we would have been able to empty the building of specimens and cases, but as we’re all well aware, the world is seldom ideal.

Instead, large taxidermy and skeletal mounts had to be shunted around to make way for access and scaffolding, while historic cases full of objects and the largest free-standing specimens had to be boxed in to protect against dust and falling debris from the work.

People from Maurice Ward Art Handling and William Tracey & Sons to assist with moving somewhere in the region of 20,000 objects and historic cases from the First Floor and Balcony spaces. All of this was to get the building ready for the first phase of roof work – the installation of a crash deck beneath the glass ceiling, which is due to begin in the next few weeks….[More at link below]

Persevering Through The Pandemic (The Natural Sciences Collections Association Blog)

Pics via Paolo Viscardi

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17 thoughts on “Two By Two

  1. johnny

    …its no more a national collection,where is that zebra from then,tullamore oh right its a just a big piebald.
    load old nick nacks,more like wardrobe or a prop shop for a porno producer in the valley,than Irelands national collection,its just a load old brit empire junk from a flea market or boot sale.

    1. george

      What are you on about?

      Is the Caravaggio painting in the National Gallery of Ireland not part of a national collection because it is Italian.

  2. johnny

    karma cant come quick enough.

    Rhino trail of tears.

    -January 2010, Ireland: Customs officers confiscate 10 rhino horns at Shannon Airport, three suspects from Rathkeale arrested

    November 2010, USA: Richard O’Brien and Michael Hegarty from Rathkeale are arrested after attempting to smuggle four rhino horns out of Denver, Colorado

    December 2010, Germany: A rhino horn is stolen from Allwetterzoo, Muenster

    March 2011, France: A 19th century rhino horn is stolen from Museum of Natural History in Rouen

    April 2011, Portugal: Two rhino horns dating back to the 18th century are stolen from the Science Museum of the University of Coimbra

    February 2011, UK: Mounted heads of black rhinos are stolen from an auctioneer

    May 2011, UK: Burglars break into the Education Museum in Surrey and steal a rhino head

    June 2011, Italy: Three horns are taken from the La Specola Museum at the University of Florence

    June 2011, Germany: The entire upper jaw of a rhino, with two horns attached, are taken from Hamburg Zoological Museum. Four further horns are also taken

    June 2011, Germany: Two men are reported to have sawn off and robbed the horns of a stuffed rhino at a hunting museum, near Wolfsburg

    June 2011, Germany: An eight-inch rhino horn is stolen from its glass case at Bamberg’s Natural History Museum

    July 2011, England: A Victorian rhino exhibit is stolen from Ipswich Museum, in Norfolk

    August 2011, Holland: Three rhino horns are stolen from Rotterdam’s Natural History Museum

    December 2011, France: Thieves burst into the museum of hunting and nature in Paris, gas the security guards and make off with the horn of a rhino captured in South Africa in the 1980s

    January 2013, Norway: Chinese artefacts, some over 4,000 years old, are stolen from the Museum of Decorative Arts in Bergen

    April 2013, Ireland: Four rhino heads and their eight horns from 19th century Kenya and Sudan are stolen from the storeroom of Ireland’s National Museum in Swords, North Dublin-

    WTF were they doing with them in first place-part of ‘national’ collections,yeah right.

    1. Papi

      If I get what you’re trying, badly, to say, it’s the natural history museums fault that rhino horns have been stolen around the world by Limerick thieves and also isn’t Irish enough for you?

      More tobacco, johnny, your stupid is showing again.

      1. johnny

        …….but,but how did these ‘natural’ history museums end up with so much horn-duh!
        -it’s the rhinos fault:)

  3. Zaccone

    The Dead Zoo is great. A really unique experience, everyone I know whos been has loved it – kids or adults.

    1. Janet, dreams of an alternate universe

      +1
      it’s a very fine example of a period when collections and attempting classifications where a science,
      and like it or not Johnny the Brit Empire is also our history at least a part of it.

    2. alickdouglas

      +1 Worked there briefly, love it. Love the weird floorboards, the smell, some of the stuff in the collection is strange and unique. I even love the fact that the upper floors are hardly ever open. It is always extremely exciting to get to see the stuff up there. Part of me wishes that they would update some of the labelling, and change some of the more worn out animals, but really, it just needs a good dusting. And a new roof, ffs.

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