Here at the Museum, our volunteers work at the front desk, lead school tours, maintain the garden, care for our live animals, set up temporary exhibits, run special events and much more. With only a small paid staff, we rely on their help to keep the Museum running smoothly. Find out what it’s like to be a Museum Volunteer!
The Museum kicked off National Volunteer Week on Monday with a visit to Elkhorn Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve. This was a great opportunity with two purposes: our staff was able to thank our volunteers by offering them a fun new learning experience, and our volunteers were able to help another local organization.
Our morning began with a project at the Reserve’s greenhouse. Under the supervision of stewardship specialist Bree Candiloro, our volunteers divided and transplanted creeping wild rye into over 700 individual pots. This native grass will later be planted on habitat restoration sites around the slough property. Our group was also treated to a look at the demonstration garden beside the greenhouse, which is currently putting on a showy display of California poppies, sky lupine, succulent lupine, sticky monkeyflower, and a variety of grasses, including purple needlegrass, the official grass of the state of California.
Museum volunteers working alongside Slough staff and volunteers to transplant creeping wild rye.
Admiring the demonstration garden beside the greenhouse
After a break for lunch (which included a gorgeous view of the slough and a visit from cliff swallows and Western bluebirds), Volunteer Coordinator Amanda Ankenbrandt led us on a tour of the visitor’s center before taking us outside for a hike on the 2.5 mile South Marsh Loop Trail, which passes through a variety of habitats. The hike offered a look at maritime chaparral, saltmarsh, mudflat, freshwater ponds, oak woodlands, and grasslands. We enjoyed the diversity of birds and plants in each habitat, and Amanda shared her vast knowledge of the Slough and its history as we walked. Fun sightings included a large group of acorn woodpeckers, a number of enormous white pelicans, and native flowers such as woodmint and vetch. Along the mudflats we spotted evidence of feeding leopard sharks and bat rays.
Watching great egrets and snowy egrets foraging side by side. From this bridge we could also see holes dug in the mud by foraging leopard sharks and bat rays.
Flower of a native vetch
Thank you to all of our volunteers, including those who participated in this event as well as the ones that help the Museum stay open throughout the year.
Also, our thanks to everyone at the slough who made this event possible! Amanda shared this quote by John Muir at the end of our hike: “In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks.” It was a perfect summary of our day.
Curator Chris Lay describes how most of their specimens are prepared as "study skins," which are positioned for easy storage rather than being posed to appear life-like.
Our volunteers dedicate an amazing amount of time and energy to the Museum. As a small gesture of thanks, we arranged a field trip to visit our partners at the UC Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History Collections (MNHC). This was a rare opportunity to view their collections, which are arranged for research and education rather than for public display.
During yesterday’s field trip, curator Chris Lay treated our staff and volunteers to a look at exotic butterflies, endemic beetles, and a variety of bird, mammal, and plant specimens. We learned about the different methods that are used to prepare specimens to add to the collections, from pinning bugs to traditional taxidermy. An intern even shared the intricacies of a method of freeze-drying that was developed by local resident Richard Gurnee, who prepared many of the life-like specimens that we hold in our own collection.
For more information about the UCSC MNHC, please visit http://mnhc.ucsc.edu/
A group of volunteers gather to inspect a large collection of exotic butterflies.
This case a perfect example of how the MNHC stores their collection. The metal cabinets containing drawers of specimens are quite different from the museum displays most of us are used to.
