Our Museums are a mess and we need to EDUCATE people

 

The one thing I have learnt over the past three years while gathering data for the Red Papers is that most museums are pointless.

I have contacted natural history museums both local and regional as well as national regarding pre-1900 wild cat and fox full taxidermies or masks (mounted heads -why mounted heads? Wait until the book comes out).  

Not a single museum has anything other than post 1900 "museum type" (false) wild cats from Scotland.

English museums -I have found one with a 19th century wild cat killed in the SE and that is it. The wild cats were subjected to felicide from the medieval period until...well, they were wiped out and in some areas that may not have been until the 1940s (again, wait for the book). Slaughtered in England...no museum has a specimen of an English wild cat "only Scottish wild cat post 1900".

Welsh museums -"only Scottish wild cats post 1900"

So where are the taxidermies? Where are the masks?

Scotland and its museums -including the Royal Museum of Scotland only have post 1900 wild cats (after a few months its quite obvious I am not going to get images of them) and Nature Scotland has four in a property it is selling  which are early 1900s and so I explained that I would like photos of those to build up the data base. This is what I got.

No joke -that is the actual size of the image I received and I had to really stare at it and it still looks like a fox...but features are there to show it was a cat but its pretty useless. I wrote back and asked if I could get photos of the four masks and the response: "That's the only photo we have" -end of conversation. No inventory photos just something obviously cropped from a larger photo. Quite insulting really.

I then got contacted by the Highland Wildlife Park which, according to Nature Scotland, had wild cats taxidermies donated to it. Then I heard back from the Highland Park who told me they were only set up in 1972 (I knew that) and had no wild cats as taxidermy -perhaps the Royal Museum of Scotland....?

The Natural History Museum (London) with whom I have been in regular contact since the 1970s was a mess. It took over two years before even the vaguest response then their Mammal Group offered to let my colleague Hayley de Ronde go through their fox collection to see whether anything conformed to what we were looking at. We completed the necessary forms and arranged a date. All submissions received by the NHM. Absolute silence. Refusal to answer emails and even phoning got me to nowhere. Here is the interesting thing: I asked the NHM if I could get a photograph of the Kellas Cat they have had since the 1980s -the one used in the BBC TV Tomorrow's World feature on the cat. "We don't have any photographs of it" was followed up by a claim that they could not find the Kellas Cat specimen and, as with the fox Ms I was told that the NHM would be interested in knowing the contents and scope of the work. 

Repeating that for clarity: The Natural History Museum (London) has fobbed off myself and the British Canid Historical Society for three years on foxes and wild cats then said they would cooperate before refusing to respond to any email or enquiry and then claimed to not be able to find their Kellas Cat taxidermy and had no photographs of it BUT wanted to know what was in my papers.

I am not a conspiracy theorist and  as I noted, I wrote and corresponded with the NHM and Natural History curators going back to the 1970s. Subjects included the dead Canvey Island fish (big mystery it seems) from which it got a report from me which I discussed with the then curator NH and we agreed on the findings. When approached to identify "mystery" animals or even "unidentified sea creatures" the NHM have always been helpful and on one occasion I even identified an animal they could not.

Which beggars the question; why are they being so awkward to the point of being downright obstructive regarding Old type British foxes and Old wild cats?

I am what they call (embarrassingly for me) a "noted naturalist" and started out in this field in 1975 and specialised in felids and canids for well over 40 years now -I even have my name attached to technical papers and my work has been used by others over the years and that includes some non-UK researchers. Is it because they are aware that they are promoting dogma and not just dogma but people who have built their reputations by citing and pushing this dogma?

Or is it just that modern museum people are only interested in press and media attention and "getting on the telly" and have not really studied natural history just the dogma fed to them so why rock the boat?

It is almost scary that museums are getting rid of a lot of natural history displays and hiding them away to be more "hip and cool" or as Manchester Museum puts it: "We are closed to the public until February 2023 as we transform into a more inclusive, imaginative and caring museum"? 

In other words dumbing down to trends and entertainment where the "nasty stuff" is hidden away when it should be used to educate on the UK's horrific animal cruelty and trade -fur farms from mink, beaver, wolverine and foxes. Importing thousands of foxes each year to replace our own Old fox types that were hunted to extinction? Importing hares and deer that had been hunted into extinction in parts of the country? How about the hounds used to hunt otter, hares, foxes and stags and how they were allowed to be injured and die after being pushed to exhaustion? The same with horses in the 'sport'? Why was this allowed to go on in a "country of animal lovers"? Why do we not educate children and adults on the seals and, honestly, any and everything that flew, walked or swam that were killed in thousands each year until they became extinct or reached such low numbers that they were hardly seen here any more until reintroductions or legislation came in the protect them?

"Oh, how horrid of those people killing rhinos and elephants in Africa to sell parts in China!" It distracts from what people in the UK did -basically for fun or earn a few pence. There was no protection for the wild cat in the UK until 1988 -almost a hundred years after zoologists had declared the Scottish wild cat became extinct ion the early to mid 1800s. Wild cats are still killed. Perhaps legislation is needed to protect the dodo?

My London based colleague, LM, has the biggest collection of Old British foxes in the UK and these include two from the Colquhoun collection (dating to the early 1830s). LM also has two wild cats shot by Colquhoun around the same time. These make unique specimens because we can see what foxes and wild cats looked like just before they reached the extinction point -their DNA, if it can be extracted, would provide much information especially about the Mountain/Greyhound fox which -we can prove- was larger than a coyote.

Along with the amount of historical reference works we can throw out dogma and this is where the problems will begin. Every source is quoted and we have, after several years, enough photographs of early to late 19th century taxidermy to show just how wrong the 'experts' are. We can show what these animals looked like and that is not going to go down well especially those promoting the wild tabby as a "pure breed" wild cat. What they have been calling signs of a hybrid cat are in fact signs of a wild cat even if far removed from the Old wild cat.

Our museums are a joke. Perhaps donators to museums who enjoy a good spot of hunting are people that the museum purse holders do not want to upset? 

Museums in the UK should warn about threats to wildlife but they should also be teaching the current and future generations what has gone on in the UK not ignore or gloss it over. We are still allowing animals which are supposedly protected by law be killed off. The fox is now, through a sneaky piece of smoke-and-mirrors legislation not protected as it is a "common" animal. The facts speak for themselves that the fox is not a common animal and may well be facing a modern threat to its survival. But, you know, "just foxes" and which minister(s) accepted that foxes were common -someone with hunt friends or who likes to go on a weekend "jolly" with the hunt?

It is accepted in the UK that we turn a blind eye to what "our betters" get up to such as having someone drag out fox hounds, shoot them in the head then dump them in a skip (in 2021) and on it goes -even badger baiting in certain areas and open fox hunting gets a local blind eye from police. 

We need to educate people to teach them that it is not acceptable to turn a blind eye to animal cruelty or killing of animals for fun while criticising people in other countries. Anyone ever hear the expression "people in glass houses should not throw stones"? Educate in schools as well as in the establishments that are supposed to be the hub of knowledge and education -museums.