Biodiversity Museum Day 2025

On Saturday, Steve and I attended Biodiversity Museum Day on the UC Davis campus. 

 

Biodiversity Museum Day is a free annual event that serves as an open house for the many biology-related museums and departments on campus. Trevor and I attended last year and had a great time. Steve had to miss it due to a Scout event, so he was eager to attend for the first time this year. 

We started our visit at the California Raptor Center, where we bought a CRC t-shirt.... for the person who sold it to us. 

We spent some time looking at all of the Ambassador birds. This is Kalli. She's one of my favorites at CRC. 

Several of the birds were out on the glove. I think this is Whistler. 

This is Sul Wita, CRC's first glove-trained bald eagle. Billy was casually feeding him while speaking to the crowd. 

Our next stop was the Robert Mondavi Institute. This facility houses a winery, a brewery, a food research plant, a milk processing lab, the UC Davis Olive Center, the Honey and Pollination Center, and a lot more. We started by learning all about microbes. They are much more adorable in stuffed form than in the microscope. 

This was absolutely fascinating. Have you ever heard of yeast art? Yeasts naturally have different colors, so you can "paint" tiny amounts onto an agar plate and then allow them to grow for a few days to reveal the pattern.  

Next, the brewery tour. It's an impressive facility. 

  

Then we toured the winery. It's also very impressive. 

Did you notice the open doors at the back of the winery? They lead out to the vineyards. 

We made a short stop to view the Nematode Collection...

.... and learn about sampling for the Herbarium at the Center for Plant Diversity. 

Then it was over to the Botanical Conservatory. It's most famous for the corpse flowers, but there are many other interesting and beautiful plants to see. 

  

  

Pitcher plants. 

I like the freedom of choice offered here.

Students were on hand to explain all about the various plants and their most interesting features. I was amazed by a demonstration of explosive seed dispersal. If you ever visit the Conservatory, ask for a demo. 

  

  

Bats and butterflies. 

After the Conservatory, Trevor joined us for lunch and then we headed to the Design Museum. I don't necessarily see a connection to biodiversity, but I thoroughly enjoyed their newest exhibit of Visual Journals. 

There was a cool hands-on area that looked really fun. 

Then we hustled over to the Museum of Fish and Wildlife Biology. It's housed in the same building as the Bohart Museum of Entomology. 

We only got a peek before the event ended and the museum closed. We'll make it a priority at Picnic Day or at the 2026 Biodiversity Museum Day. 

If you live near Davis, I highly recommend attending a future Biodiversity Museum Day or Picnic Day. Most of the museums have regular visiting hours, so visiting when there isn't a major event going on is also an option. I love how much there is to see and do at UC Davis.