Shoshone Bird Museum Of Natural History

The plan to build the Shoshone Bird Museum of Natural History had been on our founder, Richard Olsen’s, mind since he was a young boy and was a huge thirty-year undertaking. The main (round) museum was constructed with limited modern construction equipment, its 4-foot-thick, 10-foot-high walls built entirely of natural, uncut lava rock, stacked one at a time. Forty-four ponderosa pine trees (50 feet long) and fifteen large cottonwood trees hold up the roofing, which is made of belting from the Borax mine in California.

As one of the most unique things to do in Idaho, the Shoshone Bird Museum of Natural History is one of the largest privately-owned collections in the Northwest. Unlike government and state museums that feature large, expensive buildings and few things to see, the Shoshone Bird Museum Of Natural History is packed full. This collection features four generations of Olsen’s for the world to see, along with birds and animals from all over the world, mounted to display their colors for close-up educational studies. Also featured are native and exotic animals; fish and dinosaur fossils, artifact and anthropology collections, rocks and minerals, along with many others. You can spend hours exploring and still not see everything in one day.