WEIRD WEEKEND 2010: Latest News

* I am pleased to announce another addition to the line-up. Veteran UFOlogist and fortean Lionel Beer is presenting a short talk on treacle mines. This has been in the offing for about ten years now, and it has just been bad luck that there has never been a WW when he has been free to talk, and we have had a free spot before.

If you want to know what a treacle mine is, it is obviously a mine from which one digs up treacle...

With less than three weeks to go, now might be a good time to buy your tickets to the best crypto-fortean event of the year....

Buy Your Tickets here

STRANGE SOUDAN SOFTSHELL

Some weeks ago, when Fleur last visited, we showed her this. It is a softshell turtle carapace, which was donated to us by Lionel Beer from the collection of his late father. It has the word `Soudan` written inside, so presumably is African in origin.

It is interesting because of the unusually large fleshy `skirt` around it, which does seem atypical for normal softshell turtles, and even for the flapshell turtles (Cyclanorbis).

Fleur wrote to us afterwards:


Hello Jon, I found this on a site about ethnography; as you can see it is very similar to the shell you have and yours does have 'soudan' written on it. Obviously this one has been shaped as a shield and yours has not but it does look a lot like it.

The original posting includes this sentence:

"You find this type in the southern Soudan and different nilotic tribes are possible. Attached mine from the Bari. The shell is very hard and in my opinion a very good protection for every stick fighting match."

BEAM IT UP SCOTTIE

Finally it looks as if the sage of the mystery deer is over, and that its not actually a deer at all. It is probably a steenbok (Raphicerus campestris), which is a common small antelope of southern and eastern Africa.

It was part of a group of specimens given to us as a gift by Lionel Beer, from the collection of his late father, who was born in 1879 and died at the venerable age of 107. He spent time in southern Africa, which supports the identification well.

But I am not going to take the credit. It is all down to Scottie aka Retrieverman who did a pretty neat piece of detective work. Check out the link below....

http://wildlifemysteries.wordpress.com/2009/06/26/identifying-the-deer/

THE MOST ARCANE THING WE HAVE EVER GIVEN AWAY

http://www.minoru3d.com/Glasses/View-all-products.html

Oliver has bought a 3D-camera. The pictures look a blurry mess unless you look at them with special glasses that are available surprisingly cheaply from the link at the top of the page.

On friday we had a lovely day with our transatlantic visitors, Naomi (familiar to you all from the bloggo), her husband Ritchie and her mama, Barbara.

They were utterly delightful and I don't know when we have had so much fun. We went to Dartmoor, where we saw various sites of Fortean and historical interest and then went to the old family home of my old mate Lionel Beer, best known for his pivotal role in setting up BUFORA in 1962.


Lionel gave us some biological specimens for the CFZ Museum. They are from the collection of his late father and were killed around the time of WW1. Some of them are pictured here in 3D. Have fun guys.

P.S. Just in case you are too poor/ disinterested/ cannot be bothered to buy 3D glasses or do not already own a pair, we shall be issuing photographs of the most interesting of these specimens over the next few days....