There were a lot of owl specimens on display at the museum. Primarily, I enjoyed it for the ability to compare the sizes between the species I haven’t seen in person yet.

Also, while I prefer animals to be alive, these allow me to get much closer than would typically be possible.

With that said, taxidermy seems to have come a very long way over the years.

This Great Horned Owl hunting a skunk was a beautiful twilight diarama that almost looks alive. I took about a dozen pictures of it even though they all came out the same. It was an amazing work, and again, I’d prefer my owls and skunks alive, but this was beautiful for preserved specimens.

Here’s just the owl itself:

While this display scores a 10/10, others were a bit less accurate to what I hope they looked like when they were alive. Let’s review the others and see how others have done in their attempts to preserve these animals.

Note: Didn’t realize just how many there were here until now! My fingers are tired! 😵‍💫

  • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
    1·
    3 months ago

    Long Eared Owl 8/10

    Would have preferred a mystical or quizzical look to angry, and LEOs are one of my favorites, but did job on this one as it is. As the only Long Ear they had, at least it didn’t make me sad like some of the others did.

  • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
    1·
    3 months ago

    Saw Whet 2/10

    The only thing in this guy’s favor is I can tell what species it is. The body looks fine, but the head looks like something has happened to this guy in transport over the years or something. I feel bad for this one.

  • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
    1·
    3 months ago

    Saw Whet 2

    5/10

    Great improvement over the other, but still pretty rough. Must be harder to work on something so small. Still far from good.

  • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
    1·
    3 months ago

    Barn Owl 8/10

    Definitely in the decent range here. Nice specimen to begin with, and solid work on the preservation. Not quite as alive as the Shortie, but still good. This one is a successful job, but it isn’t perfect.

  • onigiri@lemm.ee
    1·
    3 months ago

    Taxidermied animals always kinda creep me out. Some of these are very unfortunate looking. (My poor saw-whets.) That GHO diorama looks pretty nice though.

    • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
      1·
      3 months ago

      Modern ones are pretty good. I think it was more your amateur scientist doing it themself back in the day, so some of these old ones are not so hot, and I always hope they met their end naturally and weren’t killed to be turned into this.

  • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
    1·
    3 months ago

    Barred Owl 7/10

    Bottom of the good range. It’s alright. The head shape looks a little off, but still better than a lot of the others. You can tell someone tried, but it looks like good amateur work. Still not very alive looking, but good for a specimen.

  • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
    1·
    3 months ago

    Eastern Screech Owl 6/10

    It’s not great, but it’s not going to be on any worst of lists. You can tell what it is, and it won’t give you nightmares, but that’s about all I can say for this one.

  • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
    1·
    3 months ago

    Short Eared Owl 9/10

    I was excited to see they had a Shortie! This one was done with care, and while not as good as the GHO, it was really nice. I saw this one before I saw the GHO and thought this was as good as it was going to get.

    • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
      1·
      3 months ago

      You should! I think it was almost as good as the Smithsonian! The dinosaurs here are amazing.

      The National Aviary and the owl bathroom at The Zenith I posted are all there too. You could do all 3 in a day if you wanted. If you had 2 days, is add the Phipps Conservatory as well if you like plants too.

      • rigatti@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        3 months ago

        I got married at the Aviary! Love that place, we’re definitely due for another visit. Phipps is also really cool even though I’m not really a plant person.

        • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
          1·
          3 months ago

          Oh, very cool! I’m picturing a penguin ring bearer! 😁

          The people we stayed with got married at Phipps.

    • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
      1·
      3 months ago

      I like it’s easy to pronounce. 😅

      It is a cute little guy. I may have to pick one up somewhere.

  • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
    1·
    3 months ago

    Ookpik Toy

    Inuktitut word for Snowy Owl.

    Contains no owl and is cute, so 10/10!

    Check out that Wikipedia link for the history. It’s only a few decades old, but has an interesting history.

  • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
    1·
    3 months ago

    Great Grey Owl

    No Score

    I’ve never seen one of these in person before. I just checked out a few pics online to compare this specimen to, and this still looks like an Great Grey head on a Barred Owl body to me. I don’t feel I can fairly judge this one.

  • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
    1·
    3 months ago

    Short Eared Owl 2

    8/10

    Pretty good job again on another Shorty. Looks slightly crosseyed though. Since owls can’t move their eyes, that’s pretty easy to spot. Otherwise a good job here.

  • anon6789@lemmy.worldOP
    1·
    3 months ago

    Pair of Screechies 7/10

    Pretty good work on both. Red morph looks good and is pretty close to an 8, but grey morph looks a bit too much like Yoda, so I gotta take a point off.