Preserving and presenting your fish specimens

Imagine the gasps of admiration if you handed in a collection that looked like this (fully labelled inside and taxonomically arranged, naturally). But unless you have a very healthy bank balance, all those perspex boxes are going to set you back a bit.

Students have been known to make one single tank to put all their specimens in. You have to remember though, that the larger the case, the heavier the amount of liquid inside. Watertightness has presented problems (and it's not water - it's flammable fish-flavoured ethanol) but it is possible. We've got an example you can look at - it's made from glass but you can also try using perspex sheets and plenty of silicon sealant. If you pick the single tank method, there's more information on this page.

A simpler solution is pre-bought jars (you'll appreciate that a matching set is preferable to random jam jars from the kitchen). You'll note that it's an advantage to have small specimens...

CC image by Frank Schulenburg

Here are some fully labelled fish in jars at the University of Michegan. You'll notice that the labels are inside - so the writing needs to be permanent and the paper needs to be sturdy. You could write them with pencil or find a suitable archival quality pen (there are some very fine-nibbed ones in the SU shop; they're marked 0.05 and 0.1). That would be fine (if your writing's illegible you might want to hire an assistant). Alternatively, you might be able to get printer ink that'll take the strain. However, there's some discussion here which isn't very encouraging - it would be a great shame to come back and find your hard work a black sludge in the bottom of the jars.

Museum collections (as mentioned in the link above) would attach the label physically to the specimen - usually by threading through the gill cover and out through the mouth with a piece of cotton or wire. You might not want to do that with a big label, but you could make a small one with a number on that matches the number on the larger label (perhaps made of dynotape or something similar). Or you could just go with the label in the jar. It's up to you.

Glenn Roadley's picture from the NatSCA blog

In the spirit of sharing enthusiasm for pickled fish (a niche interest), I hope Glenn Roadley wouldn't object to me showing you his angler fish photo as an example of the gillcover-mouth label technique. Glenn is a Natural Science Collections Assistant for museums in Sheffield. The lucky beggar.

Read on for information about identifying your specimens.