Mammal Collections

The Division of Mammals, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, houses and maintains the world's largest mammal collection with over 590,000 specimens. The taxonomic and geographic scope of the USNM (acronym derived from our former name United States National Museum) mammal collection spans the globe, with especially strong representation from North America, Central America, northern South America, Africa, and southeast Asia. The research value of this collection to mammalogists is evidenced by the 3200 primary type specimens preserved, a number exceeded only by The Natural History Museum, London.

Search the Mammal Collections

Key word searches on any available field can be run from the Quick Search box below. More defined searches can be run against specific fields from the Detailed Search link below. Don't know what to search for? Try one of the three sample searches in the Quick Browse panel at right.

Please note that our entire holdings are completely or partially listed in our specimen database at present. There are currently only a small number of specimens with images associated with them. If you spot an error in our data please let us know.

Enter search term(s)...

Find: anywhere name in locations in people number

Detailed Search