DC -- Natural History Museum -- Part I

My favorite of all the Smithsonian museums is undoubtedly the National Museum of Natural History (NMNH). I spent much of my time in DC here, both looking at the myriad exhibits and looking at the collections of plants and animals behind the scenes. Here are a few pictures from my first trip to the NMNH:

Here is what the museum looks like on the outside -- it's a really impressive piece of architecture!

The giant elephant greets you as you enter through the main entrance and walk into the huge rotunda.

My first stop on my first NMNH visit was the (relatively) new Hall of Mammals. This was a really well-done exhibit that displayed mammals from around the world in an evolutionary context.

One of the pangolins (kind of like a scaly ant-eater -- though in a different Order) on display.

Assorted mammals on display.

Some lovely large tropical rodents -- in the foreground is an agouti (Dasyprocta aguti) and in the back is the largest rodent in the world, the capybara (Hydrochoerus hydrochaeris).

A radio-collared agouti and a radio-tagged seed from Barro Colorado Island (BCI), Panama.

A special exhibit on the secret lives of ants was on display. There was an aluminum cast of an ant nest and even a live colony of leaf cutter ants (Atta sp.) on display.

View of Ocean Hall from above.

I of course visited much more of the museum than just these exhibits, but I will write about that in another post!