Getting to grips with this new look Blogger has caused a slight Blogger Blockage! I’m getting the hang of it now so hold on to your hats you are about to witness a deluge of threads!
Right, You will recall that last year I had a
Womble (
Womblus Wimbledon Vulgaris) stuffed, mounted and displayed. Not long after, I added another creature to my collection of wonderments and atrocities
Mus Digitatus more commonly known as the
FingerMouse. Another creature I remember fondly from my childhood that I simply had to have in my possession! Still trying to retain that Victorian taxidermy look he stands in a glass case along with some plants and a butterfly. Clues as to how this animal came to occupy the glass case can be better explained when observed through the right side of the case…
Additional: I have had this specimen in my collection for several months but decided to keep it under wraps until he could be unveiled at this year’s Waltz on the Wye event. I was packing him for transporting to said event and discovered that a money spider had also inhabited the case all this time! He was carefully removed and placed in a more suited location but his delicate web was left undisturbed.
*
UPDATE* 03/01/2013 - "Yoffy" himself
Mr. Rick Jones approves! He sent me a delightfully encouraging e-mail and then shared with his
Twitter followers.
©
Arfon Jones 2012. All images are copyrighted throughout the world
This is the Major Oak a large English Oak (Quercus robur) located in the heart of the Sherwood Forest Country Park in Nottingham. This tree is thought to be between 800 and 1,000 years old and according to lore Robin Hood and his Merry Men used its hollow trunk as a hideout. I paid a visit to Sherwood Forest to see it for myself and I am pleased that I did. In the mid 18th century, it was actually known as the Cockpen Tree because of the hollow interior that was said to have been used to pen cockerels for cock fighting. It later became known as the Queen Oak before Major Hayman Rooke (1723 –1806) included the tree in his book about the ancient oaks of Sherwood in 1790 and it then became known as The Major‘s Oak, and subsequently the Major Oak. It became a tourist attraction in the Victorian times and has brought flocks of tourist in ever since. In a 2002 it was listed as one of fifty Great British Trees and voted “Britain’s favourite tree” and quite right too! I believe the first time that I heard about it was during the 1980’s watching Blue Peter in a segment that involved its conservation. I have a vague memory of them discussing the possibility of preserving the tree under a dome. The image of an entire tree (and Robin Hood’s tree no less!) being preserved under a dome instantly fired up my imagination! The dome never happened, but attempts to preserve it are still ongoing, a fence was installed to protect the roots and as you can see from the photo steel pole struts have been placed all around to support its heavy branches. Although collecting the Major Oak’s acorns is forbidden some have, and descendants of the tree exist (The State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry has one on campus) back in 2003, 260 saplings grown from the Major Oak’s acorns were transplanted onto seven acres of land in Dorset in the hope of creating an Oak Forest for the future. Find out more about it here and if you are ever in Nottingham take the time to visit Sherwood Forest and see this legendary tree for yourself!
Even though Easter has been and gone I thought I would share this as its not often I get to show off my creative culinary creations! Seeing as chocolate eggs seldom live up to my expectations, this year I decided to melt a few down and start over and create my very own chocolate egg, a chocolate egg brain! Just like ‘normal’ chocolate eggs this brain variant can be broken into two sections so you can familiarise yourself with the contours of the brain as you gorge yourself on the chocolatey goodness of the other half. Once it had set I wrapped it with recycled gold foil adding one of my brain logo stickers in the process.
