Centrum für Naturkunde+Zoologisches Museum

In Hamburg, the Museum der Natur Hamburg, as part of the Leibniz‑Institut zur Analyse des Biodiversitätswandels (LIB), plays a central role in research and collection care. The building also houses the fourth-largest collection of zoological specimens in Germany.

The museum originated from the Naturhistorisches Museum, founded in 1843; the original building was destroyed in World War II. Among the exhibited objects is the walrus “Antje,” formerly the mascot of NDR.

The scientific collections encompass more than ten million specimens. The entomological collection accounts for the largest share, with around five million specimens; this includes in the holdings of Chelicerata, Myriapoda and Pararthropoda approximately 860,000 specimens and 36,000 microscopic preparations, mostly mites, as well as an Insecta collection with over 80,000 species and more than three million individuals. Arachnology and Crustacea comprise roughly 1,200,000 and 850,000 specimens, respectively. Other focal areas are malacology (about 1,530,000 specimens, more than 10,000 species and around 120,000 series), invertebrates (approx. 925,000), ichthyology (around 260,000 specimens, over 9,000 species), herpetology (approx. 90,000 specimens, more than 3,520 species), ornithology (about 71,000 specimens, over 3,500 bird species and around 15,000 eggs) and mammalogy (circa 34,000 specimens). The collections are complemented by a biobank in which DNA and tissue samples are stored long-term at controlled temperatures (−20 °C and −80 °C).

The history of the collections is marked by rescue, restructuring and consolidation: holdings were able to be protected during the war in subway tunnels; later the zoological parts were administered by the state and were scientifically integrated in 1969. From 1983 part of the collection was again publicly accessible. Organizational steps toward unification led in 2014 to the formation of the Centrum für Naturkunde (CeNak) and later to the renaming as Museum der Natur Hamburg following a research merger in 2021. Planned projects envisage a new successor building under the working title “Evolutioneum” in HafenCity.