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Massive collection of world objects at the Florida Museum of Natural History on UF's campus

By Corey Beckman
Published  November 26, 2024 10:53pm EST
Florida
FOX 13 News

University of Florida's Museum of Natural History

FOX 13 News.

GAINESVILLE, Fla. - The Florida Museum of Natural History at the University of Florida has a massive collection of objects from around the world. 

"Every single specimen here has a story to tell," says Robert Robins, Ichthyology Collections Manager. 

If that's true, then this collection has 40 million stories to tell. That's how many items are held within the shelves, jars, and drawers of this collection, which is housed in multiple buildings on campus.

"We have things that are from archeological sites. We have fossils. We have things that are in alcohol. We have dry skeletons and skins of mammals and crocodiles and everything in between," says David Blackburn, Associate Director or Research and Collections.

Many of the objects were collected generations ago by people around the world, and then meticulously categorized. 

Massive collection of world objects at the Florida Museum of Natural History on UF's campus

"This fish was taken off of Norfolk, Virginia in the Atlantic Ocean by someone named GB Goode, on 30 October 1879," reads Robins, while pulling a pig fish out of a jar of formaldehyde.

Specie objects come from all over the map, like a red-tailed comet hummingbird from Bolivia, an arctic fox from Canada, and a 45-million-year-old fish fossil from Wyoming. 

"We use those objects, these real things that come from the world, to understand what species occur. We use them to describe new species to science. We use them to describe what the past was like," says Blackburn.

READ MORE: 500,000 bats call world’s largest occupied bat houses at University of Florida home

Researchers worldwide tap into the collection when they are studying certain species. "Sometimes they would like to get loans of those specimens, and we package them up and put them in the mail and we send them to the other side of the world," describes Blackburn.

The museum collection is not open to the public. However, they are constantly expanding its digital footprint online. There is a wealth of knowledge on all the specie objects they've collected.

Just click here for more information.

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