Watch the life cycle of tropical butterflies and moths unfold before your eyes. In our butterfly emergence chamber on the top floor of the rainforest, you'll see shiny chrysalises and structurally impressive cocoons alongside butterflies stretching their newly formed wings.
Osher Rainforest
Step inside a lush, four-story rainforest that's teeming with life—from free-flying birds to exotic reptiles, amphibians, golden silk orb-weaver spiders, and enormous Amazonian fish that glide overhead.
Inside the dome, a magnificent neotropical rainforest stretches 90 feet above. Delight in the exploits of 1,600+ live plants and animals, including taxicab-like sun beetles, leafcutter ants hard at work, and a slithering Amazonian tree boa.
From the canopy, plunge (via elevator) four stories down for a beneath-the-surface view of an Amazonian flooded forest. At each stage of the journey, you'll come face-to-face with some of the incredible animals that call these forests home.
Help stop the spread of bird flu! Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI), or bird flu, has been reported in Northern California, and can be highly contagious and lethal in birds. If you have been in contact with wild birds or poultry within the past 24 hours of your visit, please DO NOT enter Osher Rainforest. Thank you for helping keep our animals safe and healthy! For more information on HPAI, please visit cdc.gov/flu/avianflu.
About the dome
Housed within a spectacular 90-foot-diameter glass dome, our rainforest exhibit is the largest of its kind in the world. With temperatures of 82–85 degrees and humidity at 75 percent or above, it will instantly transport you to some of the most biodiverse places on Earth.
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Tropical flora
The rainforest's living plants include trees like the Brazilian beauty leaf and West Indies mahogany, dozens of shrubs—including Theobroma cacao, the plant from which chocolate is made—and hundreds of flowering plants, from begonias and philodendrons to orchids, bromeliads, and our rare corpse flower.
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Animals of the rainforest
More than 1,600 live animals reside in our rainforest dome, including 250 free-flying birds and butterflies and close to 100 exotic reptiles and amphibians. From the bright flashes of blue morpho butterflies to the jewel-like colors of poison-dart frogs, you'll see fauna at its most dazzling.
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The flooded forest
Surround yourself with hundreds of tropical, freshwater fish by taking the flooded forest tunnel, a transparent passage that plunges right through our 100,000-gallon Amazonian tank. See cichlids dart through the roots of a mangrove cluster while turtles and arowana soar overhead.
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Hours & location
Osher Rainforest opens 30 minutes after the museum opens Monday–Saturday.
Monday–Saturday, 10 am–4:45 pm
Sunday, 11 am–4:45 pm
Enter the rainforest on the Main Floor, across from the Academy Café.
Grainy cochran frogs, known as "glass frogs," have translucent bellies that reveal bones and organs.
That splash in Osher Rainforest could be an arowana. Meet our elegant, occasionally acrobatic Amazonian fish.
Ascend into the rainforest canopy for a week of science crafts, activities, coloring, and videos for ages 4-8.
Welcome to the Academy's hub for exploration, with books, games, specimens, and more. Open daily; hours vary.
Discover how animals have evolved fascinating methods of living in and out of water.
Beautiful and social, these birds are even known to feed chicks belonging to other members of their flock.
Five new species on exhibit, each with their own superpower. Meet the supergroup you didn't know you needed.