Hidden Treasures: 150-year-old stuffed mammal trapped in attic

Thursday, 24 December 2020

An Asian elephant became home to a possum while stored in an attic at Canterbury Museum.

Just 1 per cent of Canterbury Museum's collection is on display at any one time. As part of a special series, reporter LEE KENNY and visual journalist JOHN KIRK-ANDERSON went behind the scenes to discover the hidden treasures held in its vast archives.

“The elephant in the room” is an idiom seldom used literally.

Its origins date back to the 1814 fable The Inquisitive Man, in which a visitor spends three hours at a museum and although he sees many birds and insects, he fails to spot the elephant.

Today, it is more commonly used as a metaphor to describe an issue being deliberately ignored.

The elephant in the room at Canterbury Museum is an actual elephant. In fact, it would be more accurate to describe it as the elephant in the attic.

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The elephant in the attic. The animal's skin was shipped from France to New Zealand in 1876.

The large, stuffed exhibit has been in Christchurch for nearly 150 years.

In places, it remains incredibly lifelike, with hair on its back and thick eyelashes.

Dr Cor Vink, curator of natural history, says the elephant cannot be removed from the attic.

But it has also sustained damage. It lost its tusks and part of its trunk in the earthquakes, and more recently a possum was discovered nesting in its straw stuffing.

Those old enough may remember seeing the male Asian elephant on display alongside other large mammals.

Due to a lack of space, it was relocated to the “mammal attic” in the mid-90s – where it cannot now be removed, because it's too big.

Dr Cor Vink, curator of natural history, remembers seeing the elephant as part of the exhibits.

“When I was a kid there was a gallery with a rhino, an elephant, a bison, a polar bear … all the cool big mammals,” he says.

“It was moved into the attic and the floors were built-up around it, so we have no way of moving it out.

The hole in the elephant’s skin where a possum gained entry and made its nest.

“This is a heritage building, so we can't take it through the roof.”

The elephant arrived in New Zealand in 1876 from the French National Museum of Natural History, in exchange for moa bones.

It was shipped as a “flat, salted skin” and mounted on a wooden frame by renowned Austrian taxidermist Andreas Reischek.

“They didn’t want to ship all the bones, so they made the frame underneath. They built the muscle over the top to hang the skin off,” Vink says.

“When they salt the skin, it shrinks a bit so its legs are slightly shorter than they would be.”

Reischek was brought over by Canterbury Museum founder Sir Julius von Haast and in total he created animal displays from 30 chests of skins during his time in Christchurch.

“He did pretty amazing taxidermy,” Vink says.

“Modern taxidermists would struggle to do as good a job.”

Plans are afoot to redevelop Canterbury Museum, at which point the elephant could go back on display.

“People will remember it and wonder what happened to it,” Vink says.

“If the museum redevelopment goes ahead, this could be something that we feature. It needs a bit of tender loving care but there are people out there who could fix it up.”

The items listed in this article are not currently on public display.