Beyond Bones

Those who are frequent visitors to the Morian Hall of Paleontology might have noticed that a familiar face has reappeared. The very last section of the exhibit hall now shows a life-sized version of a female Australopithecus afarensis. Not just any afarensis, mind you, but rather a fleshed-out model of the famous Lucy. One can […]

If you’ve gazed with wide-eyed wonder at the museum’s Frensley-Graham Hall of African Wildlife and the adjacent Farish Hall of Texas Wildlife, you can thank curator Dr. Dan Brooks for his loving attention to detail.  Since 1999 he’s been an integral part of the world at HMNS, overseeing the institution’s vast vertebrate specimens collection. Bringing […]

So what is a Queen Conch?  First, they are Mollusks also commonly referred to as Sea Snails. They were once commonly found around the Florida coast and in much of the Caribbean Sea in great quantities. However they have been on the Endangered Species List for many years, and it is against the law to […]

The stale sticky days of high summer are upon Houston – and also Egypt (although the Egyptian summer has stayed mild so far). What time of year could feel less fresh? For the Egyptians, however, now was the start of the year, a time of new beginnings. Egypt, as no Egyptologist can avoid telling you, […]

I’ve been doing aquatic bird surveys at McGovern Lake in Hermann Park for over a decade, but that will have to be a blog topic for the future!  Every now and then my son comes with me, and he’s pretty much a reptile-magnet.   We now have documented the following four species of freshwater turtles at […]

After long sea voyages in the early 1800’s, sailors returned home to wives, mothers and sweethearts with wondrous gifts from their travels.  Among these wondrous and exotic gifts were what we now call  “Sailor’s Valentines.”  These intricate designs created with seashells were highly sought after, then and now.  There are many serious collectors of these […]

August 10 marks the anniversary of the Pueblo Revolt against the Spaniards. This took place in 1680 and resulted in the expulsion of the Spanish presence for a period of twelve years. The consequences of this revolt continue to today. New Mexico is home to nineteen Pueblos, all separate nations with their own government. They […]

Part of the dynamic and hands-on team that keeps the Cockrell Butterfly Center humming and fluttering with life on a daily basis, horticulturist-slash-entomologist Theresa Lancaster has a very important role on the front lines inside our butterfly sanctuary and learning center.  On any given day you can find her tending to the endless, exotic vegetation […]

Kachina dolls are familiar Native American museum objects. They appear in art galleries and anthropology exhibits alike, but they are often misrepresented, misidentified, and misunderstood. Even the term kachina leads to confusion; it is an Anglicized spelling of the Hopi word katsina (singular) or katsinam (plural). In the Hopi worldview, katsinam take on three different […]

The HMNS staff has been putting this quieter time in the galleries to great use.  Over time in every museum, permanent galleries and temporary exhibitions require maintenance.  However, it can be difficult to justify closing a gallery to complete maintenance work when you have visitors wanting to enjoy the collection.   The crew is using the […]