Lurking deep in a dark crevice of an old museum, this nightmarish creature has been biding its time, hiding among other strange reptiles, bones and killer sea creatures.
The ghoulish 100-year-old fruit bat is just one of thousands of unusual specimens to be shown to the public for the first time at The Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia.
To celebrate its bicentenary this year, curators at the nation’s oldest natural history museum are bringing the public into the labyrinthine museum’s normally off-limits nooks and crannies for daily tours.
Ghoulish: A fruit bat that hung from trees in India over a hundred years ago will be viewed by some visitors to the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia
They may even spot a polar bear skeleton, an extinct Caribbean Monk Seal - or boxes of beautiful shells that when alive can kill a human.
‘This is a rare opportunity to get a firsthand look at some of the most stunning, and sometimes bizarre, creatures you've ever seen,’ said Academy President and Chief Executive Officer George Gephart Jr.
‘We can't wait to open our doors and show off nature's, and the Academy's, wondrous bounty.’
Strange specimen: The fruit bat is just one of the hundreds of weird and wonderful creatures in the museum's collection
Its many historic collections even include Thomas Jefferson's fossils.
The Academy will highlight a different part of its collection each month starting with minerals in April and ending with fossils in February 2013.
Other months will focus on birds, fish, insects, mollusks, amphibians and reptiles, plants and mammals.
An accompanying exhibition, ‘The Academy at 200: The Nature of Discovery,’ puts dozens of the academy's show-stopping treasures on public display – many for the first time – and highlights research that museum scientists are conducting worldwide on hot topics of climate change, biodiversity, water quality and invasive species.
Slithery: The museum's Hellbender salamander is one of thousands of strange specimens visitors may have never - and never wanted to have - seen
Preserved for posterity: An Indian python coiled up and kept in the museum's archives for the edification of future generations
As in the natural world, the axiom ‘adapt or die’ applies to the Academy, which like many museums has struggled in the past decade with a shrinking endowment and greater competition for philanthropic dollars.
While founded in 1812, the museum continues to stay relevant with scientists conducting groundbreaking research into avian flu in Vietnam, testing streams in Pennsylvania's Marcellus Shale gas drilling region and examining oysters for environmental fallout of the Gulf oil spill.
Others are developing pain medicine from cone snail toxin and examining whether biofuels can be developed from the wood-digesting enzymes of ship worms.
Ancient artifacts: Dozens of treasures from the natural world are already on display at the Academy of Natural Sciences
As species continue to become extinct, the images and specimens preserved in the Academy's collections will become even more crucial, said Doug Wechsler, head of the museum's Visual Resources for Ornithology (VIREO), the world's most comprehensive collection of bird photographs with 150,000 images and growing.
‘There's enough here to keep us busy for a very long time,’ said malacology collections manager Paul Callomon.
Fossils and shells: Thousands of specimens from beneath the waves are displayed for the museum's 225,000 thousand visitors each year
Strange surrounds: Collections manager of vertebrate zoology Ned S. Gilmore in the museum's remarkable collection
Proud: Curator of mollusks Gary Rosenberg shows a recent acquisition, a 53-inch shell, the longest in the collection at the Academy
Rows and rows: Director of Visual Resources for Ornithology Doug Wechsler shows a tray of Black-naped Orioles from Asia in the collection
A pheasant surprise: Doug Wechsler holds an American Bald Eagle and a pheasant from the museum's collection
Rows and rows: Director of Visual Resources for Ornithology Doug Wechsler shows a tray of Black-naped Orioles from Asia in the collection
A pheasant surprise: Doug Wechsler holds an American Bald Eagle and a pheasant from the museum's collection
Dazzling: A hummingbird from Columbia with iridescent red throat in the collection
Invaluable: The museum's collection of birds will become increasingly precious as species continue to become extinct
Exotic: A tag for a Magnificent Bird of Paradise in the museum's remarkable collection
Hidden gems: A Marvellous Spatuletail hummingbird, one of thousands of birds members of the public could see on the tour of the museum's ornithology collection
Flashes of colour: A hummingbird with an iridescent blue and green throat in the collection
Invaluable: The museum's collection of birds will become increasingly precious as species continue to become extinct
Exotic: A tag for a Magnificent Bird of Paradise in the museum's remarkable collection
Hidden gems: A Marvellous Spatuletail hummingbird, one of thousands of birds members of the public could see on the tour of the museum's ornithology collection
Flashes of colour: A hummingbird with an iridescent blue and green throat in the collection
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