News

Alabama employs about a dozen professional paleontologists, but there are many more people who search and study fossils as a hobby. These avocational or amateur paleontologists uncover a vast amount of knowledge about Alabama’s prehistory each year.

This year, the Alabama Museum of Natural History is celebrating National Fossil Day online! On October 14, 2020, we will be hosting free livestream broadcasts about Paleontology, Paleozoic Oceans, and a special presentation about the Alabama Avocational Paleontologist Award.

If you’d like to attend and participate in this year’s Virtual Moundville Native American Festival, you’ll need to visit the website where it will be held: festival.museums.ua.edu To help you navigate the website, we’ve created a video for you to show you around! We hope you enjoy this year’s Virtual Moundville Native American Festival!

Provocative headlines such as “Insectaggedon,” “Insect Apocalypse,” and “The Great Insect Dying” have directed the world’s attention to a purported widespread decline of insects and elicited calls for immediate action

Dr. Kocot received a grant as part of a large collaborative project entitled “Digitization TCN: Collaborative Research: documenting marine biodiversity through Digitization of Invertebrate collections (DigIn).” This project is led by Dr. Regina Wetzer (Los Angeles County Museum); and the UA share is $33,235; project total: $1,776,008).

Moundville Archaeological Park has re-opened its Admissions office and Museum! We are excited to be able to share the incredible history and culture of the Moundville site with all of our visitors again. New check-in procedures, as well as enhanced safety and cleaning protocols, have been implemented to help prevent the spread of the COVID-19

To celebrate its 200th anniversary of statehood, the State of Alabama created the Alabama Bicentennial Park in the heart of historic Montgomery and commissioned artist Caleb O’Connor to design a series of sixteen sculptural works depicting the state’s full history, from fossils to moon rockets.

Join thousands of online visitors on October 5-10, 2020 to experience the Virtual Moundville Native American Festival! We will have Native American performers, demonstrators, and living history teachers available to teach and celebrate Native American culture through interactive experiences.

Bama Bug Fest: On the Web is crawling your way in July 2020! This virtual, all-things-bug event has a little something for all ages and will take place every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday from July 7 to July 25.

Due to our commitment to adhere to ongoing COVID-19 safety and public gathering recommendations, the Alabama Museum of Natural History is offering an alternate online version of our Museum Expedition via our social media sites (Alabama Museum of Natural History’s Facebook Page and Museum Expedition’s Facebook Page), YouTube channel, and website.