Poo museum opens in Britain

London, Apr 4: A poo museum, believed to be the first of its kind in the world, showcasing 20 different excrement samples including that from elks, lions and human baby has opened in the UK.

The museum dedicated to human and animal excrement opened yesterday at the Isle of Wight Zoo's exhibition in Sandown.

It intends to educate people about interesting facts about poo and how to use it as an energy source. "Poo provokes strong reactions. Small children naturally delight in it but later we learn to avoid this yucky, disease-carrying stuff and that even talking about poo is bad. But for most of us, under the layers of disgust and taboo, we're still fascinated by it," Nigel George, one of the exhibition's curators, was quoted as saying by metro.co.uk.

Created by members of the artist collective Eccleston George, the 'National Poo Museum' is aimed to change the way people think and feel about faeces and provide them a chance to think about social issues regarding poo, such as lack of access to sanitation in developing countries and how diet affects the gut.

"Poo is all around us and inside us, but we ignore it. To prepare the faeces we had to build a special poo-drying machine. A stick insect poo can be desiccated completely in an hour or so, but a lion poo can take a fortnight to dry out," said Daniel Roberts, Co-curator and the brain behind the project.

The museum has 20 illuminated resin spheres to show off the different types of poo with interesting facts hidden behind retro toilet lids which line its walls. The displays also include fossilised poo (coprolites) dating back 140 million years and a tawny owl pellet containing bones and teeth.

PTI