Rochester Museum and Science Center

The Rochester Museum and Science Center (RMSC) will consolidate, reorganize, and rehouse its 14,000-item zoology collections to address its most critical collections preservation challenge as identified in a major collections storage improvement study undertaken in 2013-2014: the lack of high-quality storage and the current housing of this collection in several scattered rooms, most of which suffer from overcrowding and lack of adequate environmental controls appropriate for the long-term preservation of organic materials. Activities will include training staff and interns in object handling, cleaning, rehousing, and simple mount-making under the direction of a project conservator; packing and moving approximately 12,000 geology and paleontology collections to off-site storage; cleaning, stabilizing, rehousing, and identifying treatment needs for zoology collections currently located in problematic storage areas; purchasing and installing mobile storage furniture in a new zoology vault; and moving the zoology collections into the new cabinetry. Staff will document the movement and final storage locations of collections using Mimsy XG. The outcome will be better long-term preservation and management for all RMSC zoology collections.