Quills Out! A Porcupine Adventure takes visitors on a journey from this rodent’s evolutionary origins to its present-day disappearance from many western landscapes.
In this playful, family-friendly gallery experience, visitors are immersed in a storybook world where porcupine adventures abound—crossing oceans and continents, scaling canyons and boulder fields, sailing the sagebrush sea and more. Although porcupines are commonly known as forest dwellers, they have adapted to live in our High Desert landscape of lava rock and sagebrush. Here, these nocturnal creatures often den in caves and crevices, munch on tough twigs, and even climb steep rockfaces.
Their razor–sharp quills—all 30,000 of them—defend against dangerous predators. Seemingly slow and indifferent, they have waddled far and wide, meeting adventure with adaptation. Visitors’ experience starts when they enter a dynamic 3D cave and follow a series of porcupine adventures. Along the way, they will encounter fellow rock-dwelling creatures, ancient rodent ancestors, and meet the real-life porcupines in the Museum’s care.
Through immersive scenes and interactives, visitors can discover the natural history of North America’s most prickly rodent, including a digital experience rafting across the Atlantic Ocean, traveling up the Isthmus of Panama, and finally, arriving in the High Desert.
Adventures await porcupines in the afterlife, too. Their spirit lives on in quillwork, an Indigenous art form long practiced in North America. The exhibit will feature pieces from contemporary artists alongside living objects from our collection. Through story and science, Quills Out! invites visitors to journey alongside these unexpected adventurers, inspiring us to shape the porcupine’s next chapter in the High Desert.
This story is based on submitted information and has not been verified by our news team.
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