#REAL DODO BIRD SKELETON SERIES#

When Summers Place Auctions was offered this Dodo, you can imagine my excitement. 'When researching the Dodo for one of my books, Dodo: From Extinction to Icon, it became obvious that most museums had acquired their specimens many years ago and no relatively complete skeleton has been put together since the early 20th century. This highlights the fact that Dodo skeletons are extremely rare.

Only one single individual Dodo skeleton exists that is made up from the bones of a single animal the others (and there are only a dozen that are relatively complete) are composites made up from bones that belonged to several individuals.Įxtinct bird artist and author Errol Fuller, Summers Place Auctions' Natural History curator, said: 'The best examples of composite skeletons in museums around the world include those in London’s Natural History Museum, the Museum of Zoology in Cambridge, the Durban Natural Science Museum, the Leiden Naturalis Museum, the Paris Natural History Museum and the Smithsonian in Washington. It will be part of the fourth Evolution sale at Summers Place Auctions on Tuesday 22 November this year.ĭue to the rarity of specimens of this charismatic and symbolic species, the Dodo is expected to surpass previous results achieved in previous such specialised sales.

#REAL DODO BIRD SKELETON SERIES#

The first near-complete Dodo skeleton to be sold in almost 100 years has come up for auction.Īs Birdwatch publishes the second part of David Callahan's series on extinct birds next week in its October issue (on sale 22 September), Summers Place Auctions, a Sussex-based Natural History auction house, has announced the sale of a 95 per cent complete composite skeleton of a Dodo - the first to come up for sale since the early 20th century.

Real dodo bird skeleton