[Nhcoll-l] Arsenic contamination on study skins

[Janet Gillette]

Hi All,

The Museum of Northern Arizona (MNA) recently performed arsenic spot tests and XRF analysis on a small percentage of our collection and confirmed the presence of arsenic on both bird and mammal study skins. We're now beginning to develop policies and procedures related to contaminated collections.

Would those of you who have a Contaminated Collections Policy or a specific Contaminated Collections section of your Collections Management Policy be willing to share that document? I know there are a lot of institutions that have already addressed this issue and if possible, I'd prefer not to reinvent the wheel. I'm familiar with the literature that relates to handling and storage procedures but I haven't been able to find many examples of policy documents.

If you do have confirmed arsenic contamination of study skins do you isolate those specimens in separate cabinets or are they integrated with the rest of the collection? Testing revealed that some of our oldest study skins contained very high arsenic levels. Should these specimens be encapsulated or otherwise segregated?

Thanks in advance for advice and assistance.

Cheers,
Janet

Janet Whitmore Gillette
Natural Science Collections Manager
Museum of Northern Arizona
3101 N. Fort Valley Road
Flagstaff, AZ  86001
(928) 774-5211 ext. 265

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.yale.edu/pipermail/nhcoll-l/attachments/20160713/46e121df/attachment.html