Natural History
World's largest twinned serandite crystal.
Contributed by Brendt C. Hyde and Ian Nicklin.
Their distinctive heart-shaped face actually helps improve their hearing. With lop-sided ears, they can easily pinpoint prey with sound alone. Photo by Steve Brace
By Brendt Hyde, Mineralogy Technician
It’s that time of year! ROM for the Holidays is finally here, and we’ve been hard at work in the Keenan Family Gallery of Hands-on Biodiversity (HOB for short) getting some new hands-on activities ready to go.
First up is the brand-new, never-before-seen touch table that we put together in honour of our lost baby bison.
Every day at the museum is a good day, but when a new object-specimen gets added to the collection, it is a great day. It was a particularly stellar day in Earth Sciences when we were able to acquire this lovely princess cut, 23.24 carat peridot from Myanmar (Burma).
ROM Earth Scientists receive dozens of requests each year to identify possible meteorites. This is especially the case when there is a spectacular fireball similar to the one which recently streaked across southern Ontario on December 12 of this year (the video was captured by astronomers at the University of Western Ontario). Do you think you have found a space rock?
Join us Thursday, December 1 from 11 am to noon EST as we live blog from the ROM during the launch event for the Burgess Shale Virtual Museum of Canada. This online exhibition is the most current and comprehensive resource for knowledge on one of the world’s most important fossil sites.
