Canadian Museum of Nature

Fast Facts

• Housed inside a beautiful heritage building, the Museum has undergone a massive renovation. Now open are beautiful, modern galleries, amenities, rental spaces, and a new HD Theatre.
• The RBC Blue Water Gallery is filled with fascinating things to see and learn – all exploring the vital role that water plays in sustaining all living things. Peer into a 4,550-litre river aquarium, play in an Arctic research ship and say hello to an impressive 19-metre blue whale!
• The Vale Earth Gallery showcases more than 1,000 dazzling minerals and rocks. Visitors will learn about the powerful forces that have shaped our planet, and how geology and mineralogy connect with everyday life.
• Animalium offers a bright and cheerful place to examine some unusual museum “occupants”. Get nose to nose with an awe-inspiring collection of insects, arachnids, and even slimy banana slugs, housed in attractive terraria.
• The Talisman Fossil Gallery is a favourite with kids, with life-like dioramas and an Extinction Theatre. The gallery shows the end of the dinosaurs’ reign on Earth and the rise of mammals, from 65 to 35 million years ago.
• The Mammal Gallery features the wildlife of Canada, from polar bears to white Arctic hares, moose, bison, caribou and cougars.
• The Bird Gallery features an impressive collection of 500 specimens of Canada's finest feathered friends.
• Step outside the Museum and see a cast of a 112-milion-year-old dinosaur footprint, then take your picture with life-like dinosaur and woolly mammoth models.
• The Discovery Zone features fun and discovery for kids, including close-up examination of unusual and spectacular specimens, crafts and a trading post where kids can check out fossils, minerals, animal skulls and more.
• In 1916 the Victoria Memorial Museum Building served as the interim home for the Canadian government while the Parliament Buildings were rebuilt after a major fire that destroyed everything but the Parliamentary Library.