The Zoological Museum at Trinity College is Ireland’s oldest museum. It’s open to the public in the summer months only and staffed by students from Trinity’s zoology school. Specimens on show include Prince Tom, the ‘Royal’ elephant, the jaws of a Great White Shark and Ireland’s last Great Auk. The Google reviews for this place suggested that there was some kind of interactive element and that was enough to convince me that this would be an appropriate place to take a rambunctious 18-month-old.

Our visit

We combined this with a return visit to the Science Gallery for the new exhibition Life at the Edges. That was not really any more toddler appropriate than last time, but I brought in reinforcement in the form of Daddy Pea and Aunty Pea so it was all considerably more manageable on this occasion.

The Zoological Museum is on the first floor of the Zoology building. When you get to the first floor there’s a big colourful ‘I Visited the Zoological Museum’ banner so you know you are firmly in a nipper-friendly zone. Pea bounded up to a stuffed critter of some kind (a gazelle maybe?). One of the museum staff members came out and said it was fine for him to touch the gazelle, whose name is Dave. You know you’re in safe territory when the staff are so chilled out about toddlers groping the exhibits.

While I was paying for our tickets, Pea became quite enamoured by the museum mascot, a large stuffed toy giraffe. Very helpfully, he was given a smaller version and allowed to carry that around the museum. I’ll never know how many tantrums that simple act spared us, but I’m grateful.

Inside the museum, you can look at all sorts of ex-beasties behind glass. The first thing that caught our attention being the horseshoe crab. It’s displayed in a cabinet with scorpions and spiders which they’re more closely related to than actual crabs. One of the things I love about places like this is the encounters with all sorts of weird and wonderful critters. Fun fact for you – horseshoe crabs have blue blood.

We looked at badgers, sloths, armadillos and an anteater (I rather liked him) amongst other creatures. Pea really couldn’t have cared less about any of this, he was just happy running around cuddling his giraffe and pressing his nose against the glass cabinets.

Hello Dave

The best thing about this museum is the handling collection. A long table in the middle of the main room includes a selection of items such as animal skins, fossilised bones, teeth, the jawbone of a guitarfish. Seriously, that’s a thing, I didn’t make it up. Visitors are encouraged to interact with these items and ask questions – nothing is labelled so you can try to guess what you are looking at. There are even some live creatures in tanks – I definitely spotted a very large snail – but we didn’t really interact with these. The staff struck a good balance between talking to us about some of the exhibits and just letting us do our own thing. As well as the handling collection, there was an activity table with a jigsaw puzzle to interest older kids.

I’m so glad we called in here as it was one of those rare activities that appeals to both me and Pea. I’m always interested in anything animal related (I mean, I prefer them cute and cuddly and alive as opposed to dead behind glass or slimy and in a tank but you can’t have everything) and for Pea, just being able to totter around and poke at things is all he needs. It’s tiny in comparison to the similar and better known National Museum – Natural History and nowhere near as slick but all the more charming for that. You can’t really touch up anything at the National. We will definitely try to fit in another visit before the end of the summer and I look forward to taking Pea back here each year when he’ll increasingly get more benefit from it.

Essential info

The Zoological Museum is at Trinity College, Dublin 2. Admission is EUR3 per adult, we weren’t charged for Pea. It’s open daily from 1st June to 31st August only from 10.00-16.00. There’s no step-free access so if visiting with a buggy-bound beastie of your own assistance may be needed. I didn’t spot loos, but the Science Gallery nearby does have toilets and baby change facilities if needed. There’s a cafe at the Science Gallery and there’s also The Perch cafe opposite the entrance to the Book of Kells.