They are all made of fibre-glass, but you wouldn’t want to spend a night alone with the prehistoric animals at the recently inaugurated Evolution Park in Tiruchi’s Anna Science Centre-Planetarium.
With an ambient setting of real and painted plants, not to mention giraffe-like brachiosaurus peering from a corner and a pterosaur suspended from a tree in the centre of the 5,000 square meter display area, Evolution Park is the place to experience and acknowledge dinosaur love – in the daytime.
“We have focused on three major periods of the Earth’s geological history - the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous,” I.K. Lenin Tamilkovan Project Director (in-charge) of Anna Science Centre, told The Hindu .
The dinosaur (meaning ‘big lizard’’) enjoyed a fresh dose of popularity thanks to the 1993 Steven Spielberg-directed science fiction thriller ‘Jurassic Park’, but it was not the only creature treading the earth during the Jurassic era, he added. “We’ve tried to showcase some of the unicellular animals like the trilobite, a prehistoric marine arthropod.”
The 38 figures were cast from a pre-existing set of models at the Periyar Science & Technology Centre in Chennai, and individually assembled in Tiruchi. Setting up the project, worth Rs. 70 lakh, took several months of planning.
“We have provisions for light and sound connections that will be incorporated into the exhibition space. We also have explanatory videos on comparative sizes of humans versus prehistoric animals,” said Mr. Tamilkovan. Most of the models are scaled down (or in the case of the trilobite, enlarged) versions of the perceived original sizes.
To add a touch of realism, arrangements are being made to add a motorised swinging motion to the neck of the brachiosaurus, the most visible of the park’s denizens.
Bilingual boards in each ‘enclosure’ explain the features of the animals. Line drawings of the dinosaurs have raised edges that allow people to make embossed sketches for their own use.
In another section of the park, stands a model of Megalosaurus, a genus of large meat-eating theropod dinosaurs of the Middle Jurassic period.
A cave shows the discovery of fire and the beginnings of human civilisation. Petrified tree samples from Ariyalur have been placed just behind it.
Several student groups have visited the park since August 5, when it was inaugurated.
