Vertebrate Collections
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Basic information about the
Lower Vertebrate collections,
Ornithology collections,
Mammalogy collections,
Archaeozoology collections and
Swiss dog breeds collections.
Vertebrate collections, overview
A considerable part of the collection are animals found dead by people or items from
hunters, game wardens, biologists working on projects, government authorities (police, customs, etc).
Those collections focus quite naturally mainly on animals from the local area.
The large sample of endemic animals (skulls of 350 badgers, 90 ibex, 900 roe deer etc.) are mainly the result of
scientific projects and were not randomly collected.
Here are a few numbers to give you an impression of the approx. size of the Vertebrate collections:
Mounted animals: 8,000
Skins and Furs: 11,000
Skulls: 15,000
Skeletons: 3,000;
Fluid Specimens: 9,000
More than 98% of all specimens are registered in our database.
In August 2009 52‘735 objects have been computerized.
By systematic order:
| Agnatha | 4 species | 30 specimens |
| Chondrichthyes | 42 species | 93 specimens |
| Osteichthyes | 616 species | 2267 specimens |
| Amphibia | 363 species | 2960 specimens |
| Reptilia | 619 species | 2817 specimens |
| Aves | 2323 species | 25809 specimens |
| Mammalia | 799 species | 18687 specimens |
Vertebrate Collections at the Natural History Museum Bern -  a synopsis
By geographic order:
| Europe (without Switzerland) | 6404 specimens |
| Switzerland only | 20827 specimens |
| Asia | 5622 specimens |
| Africa | 3977 specimens |
| North America | 1519 specimens |
| South America (without Brasil) | 1677 specimens |
| Brazil only | 5198 specimens |
| Australia and Pacific, Oceania | 665 specimens |
Unknow | 6581 specimens |
Antarctica | 80 specimens |
Atlantic Ocean | 103 specimens |
Indian Ocean | 26 specimens |
The use of Specimens in Molecular Based Studies
The NMBE (official abbreviation for science purposes) welcomes the opportunity to make its
collections available for scientific study. To ensure that the needs of both contemporary and
future users can be met the following guidelines have been drawn up.
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