"Children's Activities at the Solomon's Museum" Top 5 Page for this destination Solomons Island Travelogue by grandmaR

This is the gigantic extinct Miocene white shark, Carcharodon megalodon. The museum also has a large, full scale Miocene dioramas.

Granddaughter by "Beach" seahorse

Two seahorses are at the entrance to the Calvert Marine Museum. They were decorated by the school children of the county commemorating Calvert County's 350th Birthday. This seahorse is titled Going to the Beach and was designed bySouthern Middle School. He has a bathing suit, beach toys and sunglasses. My granddaughter is standing next to him.

Diorama of the island

My grandson is looking at the exhibit of the island topography while I point out various places to him. Moll's Leg is shown, as well as the pier out into the Patuxent.

Picture taken by one of my grandsons in 2002

This is a picture my grandson took in 2002 of an Atlantic Sturgeon. This was a giant fish dating back at least 70 million years which could reach 15 feet or more in length.

In 1607, the settlers at Jamestown might have starved if they had not been able to catch these fish by hand as they waded in the shallow waters. The settlers at Jamestown attempted to export caviar to England, but they didn't know the proper procedure and it spoiled before it reached England.

Sturgeon were powerful swimmers and destroyed the shad nets, and they also had a curious habit of jumping straight up out of the water and landing in passing vessels causing injury and mayhem. For those reasons, many of them were destroyed.

After the local people (including Joseph C. Lore, Sr.) learned how to process caviar, there was a large amount exported to Germany.

But the sturgeon fishery has not recovered in the Chesapeake - probably partly because they take a long time to mature. Females take 15 to 20 years to reach maturity, and they only spawn every 3 to 6 years.

Drawer of things to try magnifying

A "hands-on" Discovery Room for children of all ages (preschool to adult) is located on the lower level of the Exhibition Building. Here the visitor is encouraged to explore the three themes of the museum by touching and doing.

The sign in the drawer says: "Pull this drawer out and see what you can magnify"

There is a magnifying glass in the lower left side of the picture. In the drawer is a snake skin, scallop and snail shells, horseshoe crab skeletons, bits ot rock, a sand dollar, a small shark's jaw, fossils, and bits of wood.

Looking for sharks teeth

During the middle of the MIOCENE epoch, 10 to 20 million years ago, a shallow ocean covered Southern Maryland. At times the sea spread as far west as the present site of Washington, D.C. Rivers flowing from the Appalachian mountains to the Miocene sea carried mud and sand which built up the layers of sediments now exposed as cliffs along the western shore of the Chesapeake Bay.

One of the things that one finds on the beaches is shark's teeth because sharks shed their teeth and new ones come into the jaw throughout their life.

So one of the most popular activities in the Discovery room is this 'sandbox' which has been 'salted' with various sharks teeth.

After you find a tooth, you can take it to the desk, and they will tell you what kind of shark it came from, and put it on a card for you to take home with youl

Otter swimming on his back

This outdoor exhibit features two live otters. Children (and adults) love to see the the otters playing both below and above the water. Although, this one pooped in the water while we were watching.

It was difficult to take a photo without a lot of reflections in the glass (since it is outdoors), and especially with a digital camera because the otters move so fast.

Docent showing kids about horseshoe crab

The museum includes a series of fifteen aquariums, ranging in size from fifty to thirty-five hundred gallons, display many of the aquatic plants and animals that exist between the salty waters of the Chesapeake Bay, and the fresh water of the upper Patuxent River. The exhibits include a "hands-on" touch tank with live animals. Here the museum docent is showing the parts of a horseshoe crab and explaining about it.