Revelation - information about the Reveal gallery objects

Sacred Kingfisher

Two Kingfisher bird skins with labels

When these Green Kingfisher specimens were collected in the 19th century, they were skinned and left to dry while being wrapped in cotton thread to keep the feathers in place. In trying to save one aspect of a specimen - the feathers, the collector made it virtually impossible to identify the birds accurately. However, one option open to us now is to use DNA analysis to try and identify the birds accurately.

Find out more

Back to the top