Zoological Museum of the Zoological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences

One of the largest natural history museums in the world. It's in a 19th-century warehouse, and hosts an enormous collection of animals preserved in various ways, stuffed and mounted, pinned, stored in alcohol or as skeletons, with about 30,000 specimens on display. A must-see for any natural history buff, though perhaps not for defenders of animal welfare. It began as a part of the Kunstkamera and steadily grew into its enormous state. Particularly rich are the collections of insects (6,500 species) and birds (2,500 species). There is a complete blue whale skeleton (27m/ 89 feet long) as well as the world's only stuffed mammoth, recovered from permafrost in 1901.

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