SF academy was Re: Sue's Cranium

[Betty Cunningham <bettyc@flyinggoat.com>]

The Deinonychus never moved in the diorama.  I saw it the first week it
was installed.  Instead the movement in the diorama is:
squirrel tail twitching (think this is currently busted)-running water
behind tree-baby alligators wiggling out of shells.  The highlight of
the diorama for me (besides the 3 Czerkas-designed Deinos) is the adult
alligator with real pennies dropped on it's head by attendees.

I'm not sure about the exact scale of the mega-invertebrate diorama, as
other dioramas in the museum are not 1-1 (for example the giant sand
fleas and the scaled-down elephant seals).

Last time I was there, they could have used dusting.

-Betty Cunningham

"Ralph W. Miller III" wrote:
> Regarding big off topic Carboniferous arthropods, the full scale coal forest
> diorama in the "Life Through Time" hall of the California Academy of Sciences
> in San Francisco features restorations of an outsized scorpion, mayfly,
> cockroaches, spider, and the mighty _Arthropleura_.  I don't know whether all
> of  these animals have been recovered from the same fossil locale, but it is
> impressive to get a glimpse of the world as it was when "mega-invertebrates"
> ruled the land.   The hall has a number of superbly crafted dioramas,
> including the obligatory Cretaceous period (with a _Deinonychus_ trio).
> Although some of these scenes initially featured limited animatronic
> movement, mechanical breakdowns have since rendered them immobile.  (The
> _Deinonychus_ group didn't move anyway).


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