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Zoological Museum


The Zoological Museum of St. Petersburg

The Zoological Museum of St. Petersburg is one of the oldest museums of the city on the Neva and one of the world's largest zoological museums. The museum has more than 30,000 exhibits in the collection, while there are completely unique objects, such as the effigy of the Berezovsky mammoth, the mummies of the mammoth, whose age is about 40 thousand years.

The Zoological Museum of St. Petersburg, of course, is recommended for visits to both children and adults. Museum collections are presented in such a way that familiarity with them causes genuine delight and invariably leads to a personal discovery of how diverse the living world of the planet is and how many amazing, dangerous, funny, large and small creatures live on it.

A visit to the zoological museum in terms of impressions can replace all the zoos of the world, because you will not see such a diversity of fauna representatives in any of them.

The Zoological Museum is conventionally divided into 3 halls plus choirs of the second floor.

The first hall, in which visitors get, climbing the corner stairs, talks about the development of the living world of the planet, its diversity and Darwin's theory. This hall is replete with diagrams and maps, and also clearly demonstrates the postulates of Charles Darwin's evolutionary theory, such as, for example, natural selection, adaptation, variability, heredity.

From the first hall you have a choice - go left to halls 2 and 3 immediately to the main exhibition, or go up to the second floor, where the collection of insects and temporary exhibitions are located. We recommend not to miss the second floor, as the collection of butterflies on it is impressive. The exposition of the Zoological Museum contains about 6,500 species.

After reviewing the bees, beetles and dragonflies, turn your attention to the collection of butterflies. In total, 156,000 species are known, 1,370 species are demonstrated in the museum.

Also on the choirs of the second floor exhibitions are held.

In the second hall of the first floor, a large part of the space is dedicated to the theme of maritime communities. Here you can "plunge" into the waters of all oceans and seas, see their marine inhabitants. This section recreates several aquariums with inhabitants of tropical shallow water, and also created dioramas illustrating the reefs of several seas, including those located on the territory of Russia. Here, visitors can learn about edible clams - oysters, read about the extraction of corals used for jewelry purposes and about sponges, also used by humans in everyday life.

Separate belts are devoted to crustaceans and echinoderms.
The next class of animals that visitors meet in the second room are reptiles (reptiles).

At one of the booths exhibited a real rarity - a stuffed multi-meter anaconda. This acquisition for Kunstkamera was made by Peter the Great. Subsequently, after the separation of the Zoological Museum from Kunstkamera, this exhibit moved to the section of reptiles and today remains one of the oldest in the museum.

On the showcases with snakes you can learn more about their species - pythons, boas, cobras, snakes, vipers, sea snakes. It is possible to dispel some myths about their aggressiveness and poisonous bites, to find out more who and where is really to be feared, and who does not pose a threat to humans.

The collection of birds in the Zoological Museum of St. Petersburg is the largest in the world! No other museum, neither in Europe nor in the USA, has collected so many exhibits of modern birds. Only stuffed birds of more than 3,500 units, all in the ornithological collection - 4,768 museum exhibits.
During the visit to the museum, of course, you will not be able to examine each bird, but you can definitely appreciate the diversity of this class.

Many showcases of this exposition recreate the natural conditions and habitats of birds. Beautiful dioramas make it possible to understand the size of a bird in comparison with other objects, its way of life and interclass relations with representatives of its own species. Bright showcases with birds in flight, on nests, branches and in the water invariably cause a lively interest in children and adults.

The third hall of the museum is completely devoted to mammals.

The central exposition of this hall are the mammoths, as the most ancient members of the elephant family. Mammoths were about 2 times the size of modern African elephants and 3 times heavier. The size of the average mammoth can be estimated by its skeleton, standing in the center of the hall.

On the territory of modern Russia, the remains of mammoths were found in large numbers in the permafrost of Siberia, the Krasnoyarsk Territory and the Republic of Sakha. Among the exhibits you can see the mummy of the mammoth, found in the permafrost. Presented here is an illustrated generic tree of elephants, which traces the path of this species from mammoths to modern elephants.

Also in the center of the hall and lateral expositions are located the show-windows with representatives of artiodactyls and solids. Here are both mammals of the Northern Hemisphere, found in Russia, and inhabitants of the Southern Hemisphere, such as zebras, hippos, giraffes.

Conventionally, most of the third hall is divided in half. On the right, visitors will see those animals that live in different climatic zones in Russia.
The last visitors to the museum are acquainted with - predators .. Pride lions can be seen on one of the showcases.

Near the lions are located and other inhabitants of Africa - rhinos, giraffes, zebras. Next - a kangaroo and rodents shroud.

A trip to the Zoological Museum in St. Petersburg is a fascinating and informative leisure for the whole family. The museum can not be called multimedia or equipped with the latest technology of the museum. But that volume of museum exhibits and the colorful format of their display are truly impressive!

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