Largest moa exhibition in world opens today

Mike Dickison with some of the moa bones which will be displayed in a new exhibition. Photo/Stuart Munro

Whanganui Regional Museum opens the world's largest permanent moa bone exhibition today.

Its collection of more than 2000 moa bones and skeletons has been brought out of storage to create what will be a landmark resource for the public, researchers and scientists worldwide.

Museum curator of natural history Mike Dickison - an expert in flightless birds - said the bones had been largely unknown and inaccessible for years. Many had never been on display.

They will be displayed in restored 100-year-old cases.

Dr Dickison said the museum now had a 3D scanner, allowing copies of the bones to be sent all over the world.

Most of the bones were excavated from the Makirikiri swamp near Upokongaro in the first half of the 20th century. What made the collection remarkable was its diversity, he said - it includes 10 full skeletons as well as eggs and other moa artifacts.

"These bones provide a clear picture of what life was like at the Makirikiri swamp a thousand years ago. We have young, old, male and female of four or five species - it's quite remarkable."

Moa science was still evolving and there were many things about these extinct, completely flightless birds scientists still don't know.

"When these bones were dug out of the swamp, no one even knew DNA existed. Scientists always thought there was a large moa species and a small moa species, but once they started taking DNA they discovered the really big moa were female and the small ones were male.

"It's very unusual among birds to have the females so much bigger."

Dr Dickison said there were nine or 10 species of moa known.