G’day Martin,
The crossing of the legs on bird skins serves
several purposes but the most obvious is that it stops them “flapping up
and down” and ultimately falling or being pulled or knocked off if
handled carelessly - as specimens dry out the skin becomes quite brittle and
very fragile, especially on smallish birds. I don’t know about other
museums but in the ANWC in Canberra, when a specimen is prepared usually a
metal or wooden rod pierces (inside what remains of) the skull near the base of
the upper mandible and extends down through the gutted and stuffed body to
emerge under the tail (most specimens are stored on their backs). The legs are
also tied (crossed) under this rod to give extra strength as most museum labels
are also tied onto the legs. Even with the legs in a crossed position it is
still possible to take most tarsus, toe or claw measurements on most birds
although I did have some problems measuring some swallow species for the next
volume of HANZAB for the text writer, Jamie Mathew. I would hate to try a
hummingbird!
Hope this in some way resolves your
question.
All the best for the New Year (and to all
the COGgies as well),
Cheers,
Mark
From: Martin and
Frances [
Sent: Tuesday, 27 December 2005
8:57 AM
To: canberrabirds
Subject: [canberrabirds] Please
explain!
As the weather on Boxing Day was the variety that led me to
leave the UK some 35 years
ago Frances and I decided to have a day indoors at the American Museum
of Natural History. It really was excellent.
We spent a fair bit of time looking at their public 'skin'
display of birds of the New York Region. I am assuming that they were
prepared according to normal standards so one or two members of this group may
be able to answer my question which is "why do so many of the
specimens have their legs crossed?"
