Maritime shipwrecksCollections | Updated 1 decade agoThis pages contains historic information and photos from a selection of significant shipwrecks wrecked off the Western Australian coast, including: Trial (1622), Batavia (1629), Vergulde Draeck (1656), Zuytdorp (1712), Zeewijk (1727), Rapid (1811), James Matthews (1841), SS Xantho (1872) and Sepia (1898). More information
Maritime history boats and watercraftCollections | Updated 9 months agoThe Museum’s Watercraft Collection comprises of around eighty watercraft, ranging from a freezer lid that was used as a life raft to an Oberon submarine, HMAS Ovens. The collection is one of the largest in Australia and has been loosely classified into four main collecting areas:More information
Maritime History Immigration and Migration CollectionCollections | Updated 9 months agoThe Maritime History department maintains an extensive Immigration Collection that documents maritime immigration into Western Australia. This collection includes artefacts such as: documents, on board images, clothes, shipboard newsletters, posters and postcards of ports visited during the voyage, crossing the line certificates, menus, tableware, table and bathroom linen, memorabilia, personal souvenirs, commercially produced souvenirs, cabin luggage, trunks and suitcases and shipboard games.More information
Rock CollectionCollections | Updated 9 months agoThe Earth and Planetary Sciences department at the Western Australian Museum maintains a small but diverse collection of rocks. The department’s rocks are mostly derived from Western Australia, but also include a range sourced from international localities. This collection includes historic rock specimens from early Western Australian geologists such as Edward T. Hardman and Henry YL Brown. More recent additions to the Rock Collection include:More information
Mineral CollectionCollections | Updated 9 months agoThe Earth and Planetary Sciences department at the Western Australian Museum maintains a comprehensive reference collection of minerals from Western Australia. The Mineral Collection comprises three components:More information
Meteorite CollectionCollections | Updated 9 months agoThe Meteorite Collection at the Western Australian Museum is recognised internationally as one of the most significant in the southern hemisphere. The collection contains around 14,000 specimens from 750 distinct and described meteorites. These specimens represent most of the 46 known groups of meteorites, plus a number of anomalous and unique meteorites.More information
Fossil CollectionCollections | Updated 9 months agoThe Fossil Collection comprises approximately 1,500,000 specimens and is divided into five main categories: vertebrate body fossils, invertebrate body fossils, plant fossils, structures built by bacteria (ie, stromatolites), and trace fossils (eg, trackways and burrows). Specimens from all continents are represented, although the main focus of the collection is on Western Australia. Within the vertebrate fossils collection, significant items include:More information
Crustacea SectionCollections | Updated 9 months agoThe Crustacean Collection of the Western Australian Museum comprises marine, freshwater and terrestrial animals, which total over 103,000 specimens. Crustaceans are part of the phylum Arthropoda, which are invertebrates with a hard outer skeleton (cuticle) and jointed legs. This group includes animals such as spiders, scorpions, ticks, mites, centipedes, millipedes and of course crustaceans such as lobsters, crabs, prawns and barnacles.More information
Marine Invertebrates SectionCollections | Updated 9 months agoThe Western Australian Museum’s Marine Invertebrates Section comprises specimens from many aquatic animals including Cnidaria, ascidians, Bryozoa, Brachiopoda, ctenophores, Foraminifera and others! Although all aquatic groups are collected and studied, this collection mainly focuses on Porifera (sponges), echinoderms (e.g. sea stars) and scleractinian (hard) corals. The Marine Invertebrates Collection comprises approximately 63,000 specimens, covering eleven different phyla. More information
Fish (Ichthyology) SectionCollections | Updated 9 months agoThe Museum’s Fish collection comprises nearly 200,000 specimens from some 280 different families. The collection holds marine and freshwater fish, bony fish and cartilaginous fish (sharks and rays) and includes everything from tiny fish to very large fish. It is primarily focused on Western Australian fishes, but contains extensive specimens from other parts of Australia and from elsewhere in the world, especially our nearest neighbours, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea.More information
Worm SectionCollections | Updated 9 months agoThe Western Australian Museum’s Worm Collection comprises specimens from a wide range of unrelated animals commonly referred to as worms owing to their generally long and skinny bodies. There are approximately 42,000 specimens in the collection. The collection includes commonly encountered and well known groups of worms' such as annelids like earthworms, leeches and tube worms, as well as lesser known groups such as the peanut worms (Sipuncula), innkeeper worms (Echiura) and ribbon worms (Nemertea).More information
Mollusc (Malacology) SectionCollections | Updated 9 months agoThe Western Australian Museum's Mollusc Collection represents molluscs collected from Western Australia, other parts of Australia, and from the wider world. The collection consists of approximately 400,000 lots. More information