Today's biology teachers are confronted with many challenges as they endeavour to maintain or improve the quality of their courses. Increasing enrollments, decreasing budgets, environmental considerations, student concerns, and curriculum changes often necessitate change. Providing a quality laboratory experience under such constraints is difficult, especially when looking for an alternative that involves genuine materials. Although compromises were inevitable, the quality of these exercises is for the most part equal to, and in some ways better, than their predecessors. However, for those not familiar with the advantages and opportunities, the task of introducing fresh organs seems daunting. To ensure success, developing fresh organ exercises should occur in a three step process: (1) development and/or refinement of knowledge base and skills through study of organ structure; (2) research into specimen acquisition, material requirements and preliminary dissections; and (3) exercise development followed by implementation/experimentation through teacher-demonstration and later student-centered dissections. (Contains 2 figures, 16 resources and 5 online resources.)