Hello,
I am wondering what the best practice way to mark an object number on a
horn or bone is.  Our museum has a large natural history collection as
well as local history and ethongraphic collections.  We primarily are not
a reserch institution, instead we focus on education.  Many of our
collections, including the much of natural history collections, was given
to the museum by the museum's founder.  There is a difference of opinion
among staff on this subject.  One person says that it is alright to
permanently mark object identification numbers directly with permanent ink
on horn and bone objects and cites another museum where she works. 
Someone else says that according to museum best practice standards a
barrier of B-72 or B-76 must be put down first to make it reversable and
protect the objects.  The object numbers in question are not collector
numbers, site numbers, or refering to anything before the objects came to
the museum.  They are numbers assigned by the museum to help keep track of
the objects.  They do not even refer uniquely to the single object, they
are numbers that were given in the past that refer to the species.  An
accession number is going to be assigned in the near future that will also
need to be put on the object.  There also are no holes or areas where a
tag can easily be affixed.

Thanks.

Beau Harris

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