Yesterday I had to pleasure for a quick visit to the Brussels Natural History Museum. Although they do have a zoo licence they are an natural history museum. Although the core of their collection is a dinosaur (and mosasaur) exhibition they also have interesting sections in biodiversity in urban areas, human evolution, evolution in general and an exhibition on 250 years of history of the natural history which includes information on the 19th century Brussels zoo (which was next to the museum) showing among others one of the former zoos elephants, a thylacine and several former inhabitants of Antwerp Zoo, like an Eastern Lowland Gorilla. The reason they have a zoo licence is that next to their pinned invertebrate collection they also have around 20 enclosures with different invertebrates on show. This as a background as my main goal of the visit was a temporary exhibition on poison (more information here. Next to general information on why animals have poison and on how they use it there is quite an interesting collection on display. The set up is very nice with big boards with pictures and the background information in four languages (French, English, German and Dutch). The exhibition is divided by taxon and by function. So there is a section with snakes, one with amphibians, one with lizards, one with spiders and one with other invertebrates (although that one includes one scorpion). Then there is a separate row with poisonous animals whose poison is being researched for medicinal porpoises. Mammals and birds are being addressed as well, but only by stuffed animals. It was pretty nice to see a Variable Pitohui, a Hispaniolan Solenodon and a Platypus among others even though they were just skins. The terrarium set up was good and while suitable for the animals it was as well easy to spot them. All enclosures had double glass as it can be quite crowed at times and I thought this was an interesting way of both protecting the animals as the public. The species on display are: Bitis arietans Bitis gabonica Crotax atrox Dendrobates tinctorius "azureus" Phyllobates terribilis Bombina orientalis Varanus glauerti Heloderma suspectum Bothriechis schlegelii Ophiophagus hannah Rhynchophis boulengeri Lethocerus grandis Latrodectus mactans There was one more assassin bug on display, plus three species of tarantula, a centipede and one more snake, salamander and two more frog species. For those in Belgium I can strongly recommend it as I spend a very nice 45 minutes in the exhibition. Even though the collection is small the way it is presented is nicer than that of many zoos and the education is done in such a way it keeps especially children busy for a while.
I agree. The Brussels Natural History Museum is a fine museum and a particular favourite of mine; I invariably visit whenever I'm in Belgium. As you mention, this museum is near the site of the old Brussels Zoo; it is interesting that, more than 130 years after the zoo closed, the entrance gates are still standing complete with the inscription “Jardin Royal de Zoologie”. On the subject of museums in Brussels, the Royal Museum of Central Africa (formerly the Belgian Congo Museum) at Tervuren also had some superb zoology galleries which I liked very much. Last time I was in Brussels, though, this museum was closed for renovation. Maybe a Belgian ZooChatter can provide an update about the zoology galleries once the museum reopens.
The Royal Museum of Central Africa, will actually reopen in June 2018. I m really curious how it will turn out.
The gates are still visible in the park nowadays, just as the old house from the Zoo-director (with statue). But also outside the original park we can find remains from Zoo Brussel. While the Zoo closed in 1878, the old Balat Glasshouse remained for a while. The glasshouse was created by Alphonse Balat in 1854 and was a first attempt for the royal gardens in Laken. In the Zoo this was created for the Victoria amazonica lille.When the Zoo closed, the glasshouse stayed within the citypark (Leopold-park). Later the glasshouse has been relocated to the Kruidtuin garden in Brussels (Sint-Joost-ten-Node) and in 1941 to the botanical gardens Meise. At this moment we can still enjoy the view from this glasshouse in Meise. It has been fully renovated in 2015, and is used as a event-location during the summer. Last week we visited the botanical gardens in Meise, and made these photo's.
Hereby some pictures from the gate and director-building (behind the building you can see the European parliament). Pictures from 2017.
I am not a big fan of the new museum, the collection seemed more impressive before the remodeling. Hereby some pictures from last month. There was also much attention to political-correct changes in the collection (mostly for statues).
I have not known the Afrika Museum from before. I visited last year and needed 2 tours to take it all in and loved it. I do figure though I may have had a similar experience at the Tropenmuseum Amsterdam. Overall, I found the exhibitions in Brussel very engaging and no empty space or terrain uncovered. The Natuurhistorisch Museum in Brussel with its exhibits on coal deposit fossils and its zoo evolution trail easily surpases the Leiden Naturalis.
Do you have some pictures of the old dioramas by any chance ? One thing I do not understand about this museum is why they felt the need to change the natural history dioramas at all. I mean sure the specimens were collected during the reign of Leopold and one of the guises of the ventures of that bloodthirsty tyrant in the Congo was for the "benefit of science". However, unlike the ethnographic displays the dioramas didn't actually have anything to do with conveying a racist colonial mindset towards indigenous Africans so why on earth did they need to be changed ?
Before the remodelling the had more standard (several also themed) showcases. Only the elephant was a 'loose' statue. Nowadays the number of showcases has been decreased, and more loose animals are gathered in the middle of the main exhibit hall. It seems less then before in my opinion. Also note that we found different okapi's after the remodelling. What happend with the old okapi's isn't clear.
I think there were also a couple of habitat dioramas too with taxidermy specimens like monkeys, great apes, duiker and okapi. Perhaps they put a lot of these into storage / the archives ? As I said, I believe the museum was justified in the decolonisation programe towards the displays of their ethnographic collection. These were from the begining of the institution designed to be overt propaganda to portray the Leopold regime as a benevolent humanitarian enteprise and had deeply racist connontations towards indigenous African peoples. However, I do not see the necessity that natural history dioramas should be part of these programs and I think it is a great shame if the RMCA have gone about dismantling the old habitat dioramas.
It seems many museums around the world are gradually following this trend, removing many of their mounted taxidermy displays(see Australian thread on 'Melbourne museum'), particularly those presented in dioramas, which are definately regarded as old fashioned. Its a great shame that many of these interesting specimens are removed to permanent 'storage'. In many museums modern displays seem to be be more focused on information with taxidermy/skeletal material used merely as examples. But visually this is far less effective IMO.
I agree, Pertinax I remember when a variety of stuffed mammals were displayed in a gallery above the main hall. This included 2 displays of marsupials. A smaller collection of mammals is now displayed on the ground floor, but is out of date. Perhaps golden moles, tenrecs and sengis could be moved to be near the elephants, hyraxes and sirenians, all of which have far more information than most of the mammals in the main mammal gallery, where only a few rodents, bats and insectivores are represented. Very few primates were represented in a display that replaced the old mammal gallery. The last time I visited this area, there was an interesting display of various birds, but none of these were labelled.
Have to be honest, I hate what is happening in this regard, what would the AMNH be for example without its dioramas ?
