The University of Michigan is making “hiss”-tory, with the recent addition of thousands of creepy crawlers to the extensive research collection in the Museum of Zoology. And for goodness “snake,” over 30,000 preserved jars of them were included, bringing the total number of the critters in the collection to over 70,000.
According to a news release, that number makes it the largest research collection of them anywhere in the world. Other pieces were also donated, leading to a total collection of nearly a half-million reptile and amphibian specimens.
The collection, donated by Oregon State University, contained more than 100 boxes of jarred snakes, lizards, salamanders, newts, frogs and turtles. Primarily, the donated collection of around 45,000 specimens contained two types of snakes, garter and water, as well as two types of salamanders, woodland and dusky.
Dan Rabosky, curator at the U-M Museum of Zoology and professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, said they are well-positioned to maintain the collection.
“The UMMZ is one of the only museums capable of supporting a collection of this size,” Rabosky said of the Oregon State specimens. “It takes lots of resources to integrate and maintain collections like this and to make the specimens and their data available to the global research community.
According to the release, the collection represents the lifetime work of two recently retired professors of Oregon State, Stevan Arnold and Lynne Houck. Arnold received a doctorate from U-M in 1972 and relied on a collection from the Museum of Zoology for his dissertation work.
Oregon State entomologist David Maddison, who helped coordinate the transfer, said they could no longer hold the collection and it was evident U-M was the best option.
“We have a great scientific partnership with the University of Michigan. Although Oregon State maintains and values its core reptile and amphibian collection, we were no longer able to maintain Steve and Lynne’s specialty collection,” Maddison said.
“After contacting multiple institutions, it quickly became clear that the University of Michigan’s Museum of Zoology was the only one that had the resources — space and staff — to absorb the collection. It made a lot of sense to transfer it to UMMZ, given their track record at making museum specimens and associated data available to other researchers. This will be a boost for biodiversity studies and for ecology more generally.”
The additions are of value to thousands of undergraduate students, researchers, professors, etc. by providing hands-on research and interaction.
The zoology collections, as well as various other department collections, are housed at U-M’s Research Museums Center, several miles south of downtown Ann Arbor. At 153,375 square feet, it is one of the largest such facilities at any U.S. university and contains collections, laboratories, specimen records and libraries under one roof.
Source : Detroit Free Dress
