Category Archives for Training

NatSCA Digital Digest – March 2025

Compiled by Olivia Beavers, Assistant Curator of Vertebrate Zoology at World Museum, National Museums Liverpool.

Welcome to the March edition of NatSCA Digital Digest.

A monthly blog series featuring the latest on where to go, what to see and do in the natural history sector including jobs, exhibitions, conferences, and training opportunities. We are keen to hear from you if you have any top tips and recommendations for our next Digest, please drop an email to blog@natsca.org.

Sector News

NatSCA Annual Conference & AGM 2025: Registration Now OPEN!

Booking is open for the 2025 Natural Sciences Collections Association (NatSCA) conference. This year’s theme is: Making a Difference: Showing the Positive Impact of Natural History Collections, and it will be hosted by the University of Manchester: Manchester Museum, UK.

Due to the size of the venue there are only a limited number of spaces, so please book promptly to avoid disappointment. Visit the webpage to find out more: https://www.natsca.org/event/2881

This year’s conference meal is at Zouk and we would love to see you there. Please make sure to add the separate ticket to your basket.

Don’t hesitate to get in touch if you any questions. If you would like to become a member, which would qualify you for the conference discount or bursaries, please see our website NatSCA.org for details. 

30th Symposium on Palaeontological Preparation and Conservation: Call for abstracts

Please send abstracts of up to 250 words plus an image to sppc@geocurator.org by 10th April. Abstracts will be considered on any topic of earth science excavation, conservation, preparation mount-making and exhibition. Please state if the abstract is for a poster or platform presentation.

The 30th Symposium on Palaeontological Preparation and Conservation will be held in the Netherlands this year on 26 – 27th June.

The theme will be ‘From Excavation to Exhibition’ and they hope to broaden their usual remit to include more aspects of the story of how geological collections end up on display in our museums, as well as their conservation and preparation. Examples of previous years’ abstracts can be found online at https://www.geocurator.org/events/97-sppc

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It’s Getting Better

Written by Dr Amy Geraghty, Assistant Keeper/Curator of aquatic zoology collections with responsibility for fluid collection management.

The National Museum of Ireland (NMI) Natural History Division (NHD) holds about 2 million specimens in its collection. The collection is ordinarily split between three locations: the museum and two off-site storage buildings. However, at the time of writing, nearly all specimens are in one of the two storage buildings. The museum galleries are being emptied to facilitate investigative works on and the refurbishment of building itself.

One of the National Museum of Ireland’s two storage buildings in 2006. It is an old British army barracks that now stores the fluid collection, some of the dry zoology, mineralogical and paleontological collections. (Image courtesy of Nigel Monaghan)

One of the storage buildings is a mid-nineteenth century British army barracks that came to NMI in the mid-1990s and now stores NHD collections. Retrofitting the building for collection storage has involved the installation of plasterboard ceilings, internal doors, and security and fire alarm systems. Toilets, telephones, a tearoom, shelving, and internet facilities were later installed in the 2000s.

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Top NatSCA Blogs of 2024

Compiled by Jen Gallichan, NatSCA Blog Editor.

2024 was a great year for the NatSCA blog and we have seen increases in both the number of readers and number of articles submitted. We are now reaching well over 2000 views per month. I want to take this opportunity to thank everyone who contributed an article. The NatSCA blog is driven solely by your contributions, and it is stands as a testament to all the hard work you are doing. I am pleased to say that the 2025 blog calendar is open for business, so drop me a line if you would like to contribute!

To celebrate all your wonderfulness, I am taking this opportunity to highlight the top 10 most read posts from 2024. This year’s line-up feels more diverse that ever, featuring a coelacanth, live dissections, radiocarbon dating, and fluid collections!

In descending order…

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Thoughts on Working with Natural Sciences Collections (and hoping to continue) in the United Kingdom as an Emerging Conservator.

Written by Anais Ellis, Project Conservator, Nature + Love at the Horniman Museum and Gardens.

Around a year ago I concluded three years of formal training to become a conservator. At the Institute of Archaeology, University College London (UCL) the training is taught in two sequential parts.  First, the MA, Principles of Conservation, grounds an understanding of conservation practice within ethical frameworks and principles. Following this, the MSc, Conservation of Archaeology and Museums, includes a year of developing remedial conservation skills in a lab and a 9-month placement in a museum or adjacent environment. The formative moment during this placement was my first experience working with natural sciences collections. There were fossils to clean, fluid specimens to top-up, and a taxidermy ringed seal with several claws missing that the curator asked to be reconstructed. Now, a year later, having finished studying and having worked consistently with natural sciences collections in the United Kingdom (UK) it feels like a good moment to reflect on these experiences. As hoped, they have been wonderful.

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Conservation Matters in Wales – Christmas Conference 2023

Written by Sebastien Lherondel-Davies, 2nd year BSc student, Swansea University, whilst on placement at National Museum Cardiff and Swansea Museum.

On Wednesday 13th December 2023, conservators and curators from all over Wales gathered in Swansea for the first in-person Conservation Matters Wales Christmas Conference since the pandemic. Conservation Matters Wales is a collaboration between Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales, the Federation of Museums and Art Galleries in Wales, and Cardiff University. The event, hosted by the delightful Swansea Museum, was an opportunity for professionals in the museum collections conservation sector to come together and share the wide range of projects they have been working on. The conference provided us with the chance to present our research project on a historic Lepidoptera collection. 

Swansea Museum
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