Game Commission opens Conservation Heritage Museum at Middle Creek
The enormous long gun, Lauren Ferreri said, was once used to kill dozens, maybe even hundreds of birds with a single shot. Now, the replica firearm hangs on the first wall inside the state Game Commission's new Conservation Heritage Museum, which opened to the public Saturday at Middle Creek Wildlife Management Area.
The punt gun was the first stop on an informal tour Ferreri gave a few days before the museum opened. She pointed out the firearm's wide barrel that would explode with a volley of shrapnel. Hunters would fire into entire flocks of waterfowl and other bird species.
“It was over-exploitation,” said Ferreri, the biological and visitor manager at Middle Creek. The gun was used a time when unregulated, unlimited hunting was widespread in Pennsylvania.
On Saturday, though, visitor Vince Pantanella's attention was drawn to another item in the same display, an antique Game Commission poster decorated with brightly colored art and the message, “Protect song birds.”
“It's beautiful,” said Pantanella, a birdwatcher from Lancaster city.
Basically, those two items could sum up the entire goal of the museum — to chronicle the commission's work, since its founding in 1895, to protect the state's wildlife from overhunting and other threats.
Before 10 a.m. Saturday, a few dozen people were already perusing displays filled with commission artifacts that illustrate both conservation successes and barriers, documenting efforts that began prior to the 20th century and continue to this day.
Changes to game wardens' field gear; improvements — like the adoption of fluorescent orange clothing — to hunter safety; advancements in wildlife population tracking; and homages to past conservation heroes are included among the numerous displays. Some are interactive.
Brian and Karen Mohn, a Berks County couple, especially enjoyed looking at a wall filled with wildlife traps, some with gnarled teeth, many of which are considered unethical by modern standards, Ferreri said.
“It was all unregulated,” she said. “You come in here and you learn about why it was absolutely necessary for the Game Commission to be founded.”
Making a similar point, Brian Mohn said he hopes the museum will help members of the public learn that the commission isn't solely focused on hunting.
“It's only in the past decade that people are starting to realize they manage many more non-game species than game species,” said Mohn, who taught hunting and trapping education courses.
As part of the opening event, Chad Eyler, chief of the commission's Special Permits Division, addressed a crowd of visitors, speaking about achievements in protecting wildlife, but also offering a look at the consequences of unregulated hunting in centuries past.
“That drove wildlife populations straight down,” he said, specifically mentioning passenger pigeons, which were hunted into extinction by the early 20th century.
Inside the museum, a mounted passenger pigeon sits inside a glass case. Nearby, a placard reads: “When colonists arrived in America, passenger pigeons were the most abundant bird in North America. … Hunters and trappers caught and killed the pigeons in vast numbers. … There was little concern, and no one thought a bird so abundant would go extinct.”
Birds, Eyler said, were exploited for both their meat and their feathers, the latter of which were widely used as decorations in women's clothing.
Saturday's opening was the culmination of about five years of work that led to the museum's construction as an addition to the previously existing Middle Creek Visitor Center. Though commission officials did not immediately have figures available this week, LNP | LancasterOnline reported in 2018 that the addition would measure 2,500 square feet, funded by $250,000 from the agency, with a volunteer committee tasked with raising $150,000 to create exhibits. That fundraising goal was exceeded, Ferreri said.
Those exhibits mostly are filled with items from retired Game Warden Bill Bower, who amassed a large collection of artifacts.
“He was looking for a way to permanently share these pieces of history,” commission officials said.
The museum is free during regular hours, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., at Middle Creek Management Area's Visitor Center at 100 Museum Road in Stevens. The museum will be open Tuesday through Sunday, closed Mondays.
Ferrari guessed it will be well attended, with Middle Creek, a popular bird-watching site, already drawing about 150,000 visitors each year.