I Spy Eight Shells of Blue

I arrived at the Museum after a pleasant weekend off. While walking through the lobby towards the hallway, I began to notice that our seemingly secure display cases had been tampered with. Every glass shelf had been adjusted so that minerals, taxidermy mounts, and even my favorite boxes of fragile bird eggs had toppled over and shattered. The docent of the day started to calmly explain that a  group of zealous, young girls had visited over the weekend--but I found it difficult to listen during such a dramatic moment of panic. Thankfully, the nightmare ended as quickly as it began when I woke up to my alarm.

Even though I love my job, I'm not immune to the occasional nightmare about work. And while I don't actually expect my dreams to spill into reality, I still checked on those beloved boxes of egg shells when I got in this morning. 

All three tattered, antique cigar boxes were just as they had been arranged about a year ago. I had spent a lot of time carefully propping them open to show off their equally fragile contents. Underneath the lids, lists were scrawled out with fading ink: "1. Hermit Thrush 2. Cow Bird 3. Morning Dove..." 

While the boxes themselves are enough to completely enthrall someone like me, the contents are the reason why we house these treasures at the Museum in the first place. Each shell was once the occupied egg of a bird living in our area. It's important to note that many of the shells are largely intact, except for a small hole drilled into the shell to drain the inner contents. The early-20th-century collector would have done this because the eggs were actually taken unhatched from the nest. Back when these were harvested, the precarious hobby of egg collecting was perfectly legal. This is no longer the case since legislation has since been passed to protect a number of bird species. 

The pursuit of egg collecting has a fascinating history. This article provides some information
regarding the history of Victorian-era egg collecting in particular.

Given these valuable specimens are irreplaceable, I'm relieved that their destruction had only been a figment of my slumbering imagination.