Les Fils d'Emile Deyrolle, Paris

There was an old shop in Paris on Rue du Bac, on the left bank, called Deyrolle. Opened more than 180 years ago, Deyrolle was a family owned business for many, many years that specialized in taxidermy. This wasn't your average taxidermy shop. Deyrolle was a collection of curiosities from turn of the century Paris. Filled with animals, birds, insects and seashells, this was one of the dusty old shops you could only dream about. Sadly, there was a terrible fire at Deyrolle last month - and many of the entomology collections have been lost forever. I remember the last time Molly and I visited Deyrolle, we convinced one of the cute French boys to let us into the stock room and we dug out all sorts of old tags, receipt books, sketch books and insect pins! He couldn't figure out why we wanted all of the old stuff when there were plenty of new items available. We had found our treasure and talked about our dig for weeks! If you never made it to Deyrolle - you missed a great old piece of French history - and if you were lucky enough to have visited this shop, consider yourself one of the lucky ones! They will eventually rebuild and reopen - they have issued a request for donations of entomological collections, stuffed animals, Deyrolle planks or old teaching materials. I will send back some of my gold for their collection.