Editor’s Note: This post is a part of a giveaway for tickets to The Wildlife Experience. Contest details are at the end.

My six-year-old son studied the piles of rubber poop and photos of animals. Different shapes, colors, and sizes represented the astonishing diversity of found on forest floors and sometimes in our own backyards. His task? To match poop and producer, scat and species, dookie and the dropper.

Is it a little weird that when he scored 100%, I briefly considered the news worthy of our Christmas newsletter?

Our recent visit to The Wildlife Experience’s brand-new exhibit, Animal Grossology, was filled with this kind of icky-good fun.

We wound our way through the displays, games, and interactive learning opportunities eager to learn about tapeworms, lice, hairballs, owl pellets, dung balls, regurgitation, blood suckers, and all the special odors animals produce. The kids had a blast sniffing skunk, peering at mouse remains from an owl’s stomach, and helping a massive plastic cow digest green balls. My husband and I simply followed them in wonder, delighted by their excitement over measuring 60 feet of rope–which happens to be the length a tapeworm can grow inside a human’s intestines.

It’s no secret kids of a certain age find the grosser things of life fascinating. What surprised my husband and I was how much we learned at Animal Grossology. Did you know dung beetles can clear a cow pasture clean in 48 hours? Imagine what they could do with your schnauzer!

The Wildlife Experience is a gorgeous facility devoted to educating people of all ages about the lives and times of animals. The grosser side of animal functions are just as important to learn about as the beautiful, majestic, and inspiring aspects of the animal kingdom. That’s why it was with side-splitting laughter I watched our two youngest sons race to see who could comb the most “lice” out of hot pink wigs. It was really rice, but I thought it was an ingenious way to teach kids while letting them have fun in the process. I vowed to use it as a future party game.

My family highly recommends visiting Animal Grossology at The Wildlife Experience. Our kids will be talking about their experiences for a very long time. The displays are suitable for children of all ages, but it helps to have a good reader in the bunch to explain some of the games and finer points of urine spraying and birthing-by-regurgitation. Even our toddler had a blast, especially on the sea serpent slide and oogling penguin poop through a viewfinder. All the way home, she said, “Penguin. Poop.”

Now, where can I get my hands on some dung beetles?

Animal Grossology at The Wildlife Experience runs from September 27, 2008 to April 26, 2009. Also, make sure to participate in their Trick or Treat Off the Street on October 31 from 1 p.m. – 7 p.m.

We are pleased to offer four tickets to the Animal Grossology exhibit! To enter, simply email us at with “Gross Out” in the subject line. Contest deadline is October 11, 2008.

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