Support for the Bird Collection at Delaware Museum of Natural History

在Jean L. Woods博士和Gene K. Hess博士的指导下，特拉华州自然历史博物馆获得了一笔赠款，以解决鸟类标本收藏的储存不足。目前对馆藏的威胁包括过度拥挤、昆虫的破坏以及接触非档案材料。该博物馆的鸟类藏品在北美排名第15位（119,000个标本），其中包括来自菲律宾，墨西哥和北美的大量标本。该博物馆还收藏了北美第二大的鸟蛋。这些藏品代表了这些地区鸟类生活的历史记录，并且本身是不可替代的。这笔拨款将使特拉华自然历史博物馆在保护藏品方面取得重大进展。这笔拨款将用于安装一个紧凑的储存系统和新的博物馆级的标本柜，以容纳鸟类皮肤收藏。紧凑的存储系统将容纳的集合使用大约25%的空间比目前使用的。这将缓解馆藏的过度拥挤，并为未来的扩展提供足够的空间。它还将为工作人员和访客提供额外的工作空间。新的标本柜应防止昆虫对标本的进一步破坏，并符合在自然历史收藏中使用档案质量材料的所有现行标准。这些改进将确保博物馆能够继续履行其使命，“让人们兴奋并了解自然世界”。来自世界各地的科学家在他们的研究中使用这些标本。基于这项研究已经发表了数十篇科学论文和报告。博物馆的藏品也极大地造福了当地社区。鸟类标本被用于博物馆画廊的长期和临时展览。标本也用于外展项目，其中许多项目针对服务不足的社区。标本被借给当地大学供课堂使用，学生可以通过完成收集的项目来获得大学学分。艺术家和摄影师也会使用这些藏品。总之，这笔拨款所带来的改进将使目前使用这些藏品的所有人受益，并确保这些藏品得到保护，以告知和激励后代。

A grant has been awarded to the Delaware Museum of Natural History under the direction of Dr. Jean L. Woods and Gene K. Hess to address storage deficiencies in the bird specimen collections. Current threats to the collections include overcrowding, damage from insects, and exposure to non-archival materials. The bird collections at the Museum are the fifteenth largest in North America (119,000 specimens) and include significant numbers of specimens from the Philippines, Mexico and North America. The Museum also curates the second largest collection of bird eggs in North America. These collections represent an historical record of bird life from these locations, and are inherently irreplaceable. This grant will allow the Delaware Museum of Natural History to make major strides in safeguarding the collections. The grant will fund installation of a compact storage system and new museum-quality specimen cabinets to house the bird skin collection. The compact storage system will accommodate the collections by using approximately 25% less space than currently used. This will ease overcrowding in the collections and allow sufficient space for expansion well into the future. It also will provide additional workspace for Staff and visitors. The new specimen cabinets should prevent further insect damage to the specimens and meet all current standards for use of archival quality materials in the storage of natural history collections. These improvements will ensure that the Museum will be able to continue its mission "to excite and inform people about the natural world." Scientists from all over the world use specimens from the collections in their research. Dozens of scientific papers and reports have been published based on this research. The Museum's collections also greatly benefit the local community. Specimens from the bird collections are used in long-term and temporary exhibits in the Museum's galleries. Specimens are also used in outreach programs, many of which target underserved communities. Specimens are loaned to local universities for use in their classes and students can earn college credit by completing projects in the collections. Artists and photographers also use the collections. In summary, the improvements resulting from this grant will benefit all of the people who currently use the collections and ensure that the collections will be safeguarded to inform and inspire future generations.