By Clive Roberts The Te Papa fish team currently has two members participating in the Three Kings Islands Marine Expedition. Skilled in fieldwork techniques, collecting, photographing and preserving fishes, Vincent Zintzen and Jeremy Barker are busy underwater surveying and sampling fishes, invertebrates and algae with colleagues during the day, andRead more
Last weekend, on Saturday the 13th April 2013, the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam reopened to the public after a decade of renovations. Imagine that, ten years to perfect your vision and build a new experience for the visitor from the ground up. The Rijksmuseum is an iconic art museum that isRead more
Last weekend I was out with the Kapiti-Mana branch of Forest and Bird, giving them an introduction to ferns. A few weeks back, I gave a similar walking-talk at Otari-Wilton’s Bush in Wellington. Many people find ferns an appealing group to learn. Aside from their iconic status in New Zealand, goodRead more
I also spent an enjoyable few days over Easter on the Wellington Botanical Society fieldtrip (see Leon’s blog about the trip). Here are a few more photos from the trip. It is difficult to believe that this tiny native species is in the same genus as the huge Chilean rhubarb.Read more
What’s happening in the world of loans? There are a few exciting exhibitions on in the greater Wellington region that are worthwhile checking out and seeing some of our collection items at other Museums. At the Dowse Art Museum you can see Myths, Monsters & Magical Things from 9 MarchRead more
I spent a couple of days of the long weekend with the Wellington Botanical Society, exploring the Foxton area, between Whanganui and Palmerston North. Much of the first and second days were spent in the sand dunes between Himatangi and Foxton Beach, and at Koitiata near Turakina. Some surprising thingsRead more
73 years ago Prime Minister Michael Joseph Savage dies (27 March 1940) Mickey Savage, as many New Zealanders fondly referred to him, was the country’s first Labour Prime Minister. Australian-born Savage had arrived in New Zealand in 1907. He became the Labour MP for Auckland Central electorate in 1919. Labour’sRead more
I recently co-authored a paper with Barbara Parris that investigated the scientific classification and naming of New Zealand’s strap ferns. If you’ve spent any time in New Zealand’s forests, you will have almost certainly seen the common strap fern. It has simple, undivided fronds up to 20 cm long, butRead more
人形项饰-海蒂基远涉重洋来到中国这个古老的玉文化国度 Te Papa’s exhibition “Kura Pounamu: Treasured Jade Art of Aotearoa New Zealand” opens on 1 April at Liangzhu Museum, Hangzhou, China. Liangzhu Museum is located in the heart of one of the largest and most significant jade archaeological sites in China dating back over 5000 years. 新西兰国家博物馆-蒂帕帕关于“毛利碧玉：新西兰文化艺术珍品展”即将于今年4月1日在中国杭州市的良渚博物院展出。 良渚博物院座落于中国最大的也是最显著的玉文化遗址区，良渚玉文化有超过5千年的历史。Read more
Te Papa’s Whales exhibition is about to open at one of the world’s most prestigious venues, the American Museum of Natural History, in New York. The exhibition has been touring the world since 2008 and has already been seen by more than a million people in North America. The AmericanRead more
When Te Papa purchased Easy Chair two years ago, we acquired it for its associations with modernism and with the Auckland store jon jansen. But we wanted to verify the designer. Detailed research – surveying design publications, comparing similar chairs, identifying woods – finally led me to the original SwedishRead more
By Alan Tennyson, Curator of Vertebrates I was invited by Chris Gaskin (Forest & Bird) and Matt Rayner (Auckland University) to join a party in February 2013 on the Mokohinau Islands to hunt for the nesting grounds of the recently rediscovered New Zealand storm petrel (Fregetta maoriana). This island groupRead more
Recently I have been obtaining DNA sequences from some of the fern samples collected by Te Papa Botany curator Leon Perrie on his recent trip to New Caledonia. We aim to determine the relationships of these New Caledonian ferns to other ferns around the world, including those from New Zealand.Read more
Read about the education programme Helen Lloyd, Te Papa’s Senior Education Programmer’s is designing on Creative New Zealand’s NZ at Venice blog: http://www.nzatvenice.com/Read more
Here at the haut lieu of albatross biology – Le Champ des Albatros, Crozet Islands the main study site for Wandering Albatrosses in the French Southern Territories, we have now done a round of all the behaviour testing, GPS deployments and nest checks that await us over the next month.Read more
