GOINGS ON SANTA BARBARA : Museum’s Day : Anniversary party will feature the opening of a new home for plant and animal exhibits and a chance to go behind the scenes.

Termites and otters and a bear, oh my.

No, this isn’t a new version of the Emerald City. These are some of the creatures that will be on display Sunday at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History’s 75th anniversary celebration.

For those who weren’t around back in 1916, the institution began as the Museum of Comparative Oology, serving as a center for the collection and study of bird eggs. Six years later the museum was moved to its present location and its purpose was expanded to include the study of plants, animals, minerals and American Indian culture.

Sunday’s celebratory events will feature the opening of the new Cartwright Interactions Hall, a home for plant and animal exhibits. The main attraction there is the nine-square-foot display case filled with thousands of insect specimens. A computer-operated video camera with a zoom lens is hooked up to the display case for easy magnifying.

Museum visitors will get a rare chance to go behind the scenes, too, into the Collections and Research Center.

There will be activities and entertainment at the museum throughout the day, including a juggler-tightrope walker, a planetarium show, a children’s song hour and a film-discussion about killer bugs of science fiction fame.

The party will begin at noon and end at 5 p.m. The museum is at 2559 Puesta del Sol Road. For more information call 682-4711.

The University Union Galerie at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo will kick off the new school year with an exhibit by artists Phoebe Palmer and Ken Butterfield. The show opens today and will run through Oct. 15. Six more shows are scheduled throughout the year, among them an exhibit by artist Karl Berger (Jan. 8 to Feb. 8), a Black History Month exhibit (Feb. 12 to March 13), a floral design exhibit (April 1 to 19) and an exhibit by women artists of California (April 23 to May 4). The Galerie is open Tuesday and Wednesday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Thursday 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.; Friday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.; and Saturday and Sunday, noon to 4 p.m. For more information call 756-1182.

Santa Barbara’s Museum of Art will show the film “Lord of the Dance/Destroyer of Illusion,” a look at Tibetan Tantric Buddhism, Sunday at 2:30 and 7:30 p.m. This feature-length documentary was filmed in the Himalayas, in a remote area of Nepal. Tickets are $3. The museum is at 1130 State St. For more information, call 963-4364.

If you don’t feel like pretending you’re in Tibet, how about Northern California? It requires but a short trip through the Redwood Forest Collection at the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden. Botanist Susan Stephenson leads the tour on Monday afternoon.

The garden staff cares for about 30 redwood trees planted near Mission Canyon Creek in 1930. “We’ve been able to duplicate the conditions of Northern California because it is near the creek,” said garden spokeswoman Anne Steiner. “It has the typical vegetation you would find in the redwood forest. It’s been very hard to maintain in the drought, but there is enough water in the creek bed so we don’t have to supplement too much.”

Along with the redwood trees, there are redwood sorrels, big leaf maples, sycamores, western azaleas and sword ferns. The 40-minute tour begins at 12:10 p.m., so plan to spend the lunch hour there. For more information call 682-4726.