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An egg-cellent collection finds new home at museum

A number of large square boxes are stacked on top of each other. The top one is open and inside is a bird nest with four large eggs inside. There are two handwritten note cards reading 'PLEASE DO NOT TOUCH' and 'Nest of the Wild Grey Goose'.

What might you expect if you bought a castle? A moat? Some armour? What about thousands of eggs and nests?

Well that's exactly what Paddy Mackie got when he bought Castle Espie back in 1977. One of the UK's largest bird egg collections.

Egg collecting was once quite common, both for scientific research and as a hobby.

After decades of care by the Mackie family, the collection of a whopping 36 cabinets and boxes (not cartons!) are being donated to the Natural History Museum.

Whose eggs are they?

A large white egg is pictured inside a box. Beside it is a handwritten note on brown paper identifying the egg as that of a Bubo Ignavus.

An eagle owl egg and nest collected on the 30th of April 1891 in Romania

This collection was created in the 19th century by naturalist Robert Henry Reid, before the practice was made illegal in Northern Ireland in 1985.

The eggs come from around the world and are in all shapes and sizes, and some are REALLY old.

Five snow goose eggs in the collection are from June 1909, and an egg from a Eurasian eagle-owl dates all the way back to 1891.

The journey of the eggs

Dozens of eggs sit side by side in a large glass and wood cabinet. They're different colours - ranging from pale blue and grey to white - and all feature detail such as speckling.

The Mackie family treasured their collection.

When Castle Espie turned into a conservation centre they took the eggs with them.

They travelled with the family until they were eventually safely stored in their attic for 50 years.

Nests and... time-travel?

Five large white eggs are pictured inside a box. On top of them is a handwritten note on brown paper identifying the eggs as that of a Snow Goose.

Now the eggs will be moved to the Natural History Museum to be part of its Bird Collections.

The family said they didn't realise how important the collection was until the Natural History Museum team said it could be the "best collection we have seen for the past 100 years".

Douglas Russell who's a senior curator at the museum says it's a "moment captured in time".

"We have entire nests that have been collected and frozen essentially...it's a time travelling system that's what is so exciting about this."

He hopes that the detailed notes and the specimens will create a rich record of historical birds and environments.