Summer 2009 - Scottish Natural Heritage

Unearthing nature’s wonders
What lurks at the bottom of your garden? A new exhibition at the National
Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh encourages younger visitors to become
detectives and fi nd out
Inspired by the work of Charles
Darwin, and on the 200th
anniversary of his birth, a new
Garden Detectives exhibition at
the National Museum of Scotland
transforms the ordinary into the
extraordinary.
Children can delve into hedges, take a
peek in the garden shed and unearth
wonders from the exhibition fl ower beds
and pond. They can explore habitats,
study food chains, track animals and
discover what they get up to while
we’re asleep – all without getting their
hands dirty!
“Darwin’s greatest ability was his
skill as an observer when studying the
natural world around him,” says Graham
Rotheray, the museum’s curator of
insects. “With Garden Detectives we
want to encourage the same level of
curiosity in our younger visitors.”
Highlighting the importance of
involving children in the environment
from a young age, Graham points out
that, “teaching young people to explore
gives them invaluable life skills. Here
they can begin to unravel the vast
complexities of the natural world.”
With more than 30,000 species of
insects and spiders alone living in the
UK today, an average Scottish garden
may contain many hundreds of different
species. Add in the huge variety of
mammals, birds, plants and fungi, and
you begin to get an idea of the size of
the challenge facing the exhibition team.
8 The Nature of Scotland
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