CFZ PEOPLE: Nick Wadham

Happy Birthday, dude

WEIRD WEEKEND 2013: Lars Thomas and Nick Wadham

LIZ BITAKARAMIRE: Day Four at the Weird Weekend 2013

And so to the final day. As we bid farewell to Woolfardisworthy, but only for a year at the most, what have we learnt? Sarah and Maya taught us about orbs and how to catch them on camera ourselves. Ronan told tales of leprechauns and Irish kings. We had James Newton on Bigfoot and Lars on the cryptozoology of Greenland as well as that of Jon's garden, a talk he co-hosted with Nick Wadham. 

At the end of Ronan's speech Jon was presented with a signed Weird Weekend poster as a thank you for all the hard work he had done, and then the man himself delivered his customary keynote speech. Many were moved as he spoke of the passing of Mick Farren, and excited when Jon announced that there would indeed be a Weird Weekend 2014 if he had anything to do with it. Unlike the Pope, Jonathan Downes will not be abdicating his throne just yet, dudes....

WEIRD WEEKEND 2011: Nick Wadham - giant insects

BIRTHDAYS

Today, in 1925, my late father was born. It would have been his 86th birthday. We hated each other for most of our lives, but during his last eight months we became friends, and by the time he died (with me holding his hand) we were very close. Not a day goes by that I don't think of him, and I still miss him sorely.

Also, (sorry to relegate you to second place, mate) happy birthday to Nick Wadham from Bugfest. Those of you who are regulars at the WW (and if not, why not?) will know Nick and his family who are rapidly becoming unreplaceable. Have a good one, mate.

And whilst on the subject of birthdays, whilst flu-ified, I inadvertantly missed Dale Drinnon and Tully Reynolds, who had birthdays on New Year's Day, and Richard Freeman who had a birthday on January 4th! Sorry guys.

WEIRD WEEKEND SCRAPBOOK: Oll Lewis

Today was a fantastic day. The day started off with meeting Silas Hawkins up at the hall. Poor Silas was meant to be at the Weird Weekend yesterday but was let down by his satnav, which had taken it upon himself (or herself, I have no idea how to tell a satnav’s sex, but I’m sure Max knows so I’ll have to ask him at some point) to send him to the wrong Woolfardiswothy. But as Silas was here now he was able to sign a Family Ness book for me on behalf of his late father, Peter Hawkins, who had voiced the characters in the TV series. The show was what first introduced me to cryptozoology as a child and I have fond memories of running around with my brother pretending that we had Nessie summoning ‘thistle whistles.’ Later in the day I and the CFZ were donated some Eurycantha phasmids by Nick and Kara Wadham of Bugfest SW fame. I absolutely adore this species and they are, as I type this currently sitting in my huge fauna box munching away at moist bramble leaves.

Even more fantastic stuff was to come when Lars announced the results of his analysis of some of the hairs that had been found in the local woods… Back in January you will recall that I posted a cautious blog about some foot prints I investigated in the snow at a local farm. When I returned to the site the next day to take casts I got a better look and upon analysis I postulated to Jon and Richard that I thought they were leopard tracks and have been telling everyone who visited the CFZ since this was what I believed them to be. Lars concluded that some hairs collected in the woods were leopard hairs and he plans to test the hairs for DNA so, short of getting a body, the evidence for a leopard in the Woolsery area doesn’t get better than this.

WEIRD WEEKEND 2010 LATEST NEWS

* We have just heard from Sharon - the Sunday morning fried breakfast will be back and (just to please Jon and disgust his vegetarian wife) there will be black pudding

* Nick and Kara Wadham will be doing the animal handling for the first time. They will have a display of their animals from Yeovil Bugfest. Just in case you thought the name Wadham was familiar, they are the proud parents of Harriet, the CFZ's favourite young journalist.

* Just in case of rain at the cocktail party we have bought a SECOND marquee.

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

HARRIET WADHAM AT THE WEIRD WEEKEND

In August Jon Downes hosted The Weird Weekend 2009, where people from all over the world gathered for a weekend of weirdness, packed full of lectures on Atlantis, Big Grey Men of Ben Macdhui, and many other interesting subjects.

Now me being ten years of age, I attended the ‘Bigfoot for kids’ lecture, which was held by Paul Vella. It gave me an inspiration to write a book about Bigfoot when I’m older. But then again, I have got about a billion stories running at the moment (at the same time!!), so it might have to wait for quite a while.

The whole lecture was really very interesting; we were granted permission to handle Bigfoot footprints and Paul showed us a famous film of Bigfoot that two men called Roger Patterson and Gimlin captured while on a hunt for one. Patterson and Gimlin were on horseback when they spotted the creature, but Patterson’s horse got a bit frightened and backed away. Patterson hopped off his horse, and began to film Bigfoot. Bigfoot started to get further away, so as we didn’t have zoom lenses on cameras in those days, he had to run after it, which made the film very shaky. Now if it had been a person in a gorilla costume – which is highly improbable - it would have had to be "A very good gorilla costume, because if you look closely, you can see that there are calf muscles on the legs."

Personally, the part of the lecture I enjoyed the most is the part I’ve just gone on about - The Bigfoot film. I was intrigued by the film to do a talk about Bigfoot at the next Bugfest that my parents organise. I hope that I can, anyway. Here is frame 352 from the film of Bigfoot.

In fact, I would definitely go back to the Weird Weekend next year; then again, Mum is already thinking about going back, so I’m guessing I’ve got to! But that’s a good thing, because I enjoyed it IMMENSELY!! I even had my first taste of... CHEESY CHIPS!! They were absolutely scrumdiddlyumptious (As the B.F.G would say)! You can see my monster book in the bottom right corner, behind the flowers. You’ll read about it in a second.

All the lectures were interesting and jam-packed full of information, with lots of slideshows to go with them.

The highlight of my whole weekend was probably meeting an author (Neil Arnold) and getting a book signed (MONSTER! The A-Z of Zooform Phenomena). Then Mum told me that I’d met lots of authors already, but without knowing it! Of course that had made my day, getting a book signed and meeting lots of authors - even though it was obliviously - but I was also happy that I had made new friends, and had so much fun at the Weird Weekend 2009.

BUGFEST: BLOODY BUSY

KARA WADHAM WRITES: For those of you intending to book a table on the 8th August event, please do so quickly.

We have almost run out of space and it is going to be busy. We have had well over 1000 hits on the website in the last couple of weeks and the publicity campaign has only just started!

I hope you will be able to support us. Whether you are a trader or individual, we will welcome you.

Kara


BUGFEST 4
SAT 8TH AUGUST
BUCKLERS MEAD SPORTS CENTRE
www.bugfest.co.uk

BUGFEST IS BACK

The creepy crawlies are back in Yeovil for the fourth Bugfest on August 8th at Bucklers Mead Sports Centre. The event is proving so popular that organisers have scheduled this additional summer date. As well as spiders, live food and all sorts of bugs to buy, see and learn about, there will be other stalls offering face painting, crafts and much more. Admission prices are a credit busting £2 for adults and £1 for children (5-16). To save money, children in fancy dress go FREE! Don't miss it!

Bugfest is an entomological (creepy crawly) exhibition held at Bucklers Mead Sports Centre, Yeovil, where traders from across the country exhibit, sell and offer advice on invertebrates from crabs to stick insects. There are also lots of other stalls including those selling books, crafts, insect housing and children's craft stalls. There is also a children's 'spot the bug' quiz with small prizes to be won!

Smaller workshops are regularly held during school holidays, which are primarily aimed at children who can come and meet Nick and his collection of bugs, ask questions and handle insects. Nick also visits schools and groups to talk about his ever growing collection of creatures.

Bugfest consists of a husband and wife team, Nick and Kara Wadham, ably assisted by family, friends and volunteers, who decided to bring the creepy crawly world to Somerset. The popularity of the first event was a complete surprise as 1000 visitors attended. Now Bugfest is going from strength to strength, drawing notoriety and attention to the South West!

GUEST BLOGGER NICK WADHAM: When you gotta go, you gotta go!

Let’s face it, most of us have been there, packed sardine-like in the car, luggage carefully crammed into every conceivable convenient corner, if not three, at least two kids in the back whinging about how long will it be and “are we there yet?”

You could be going anywhere, the sea side, nanna and granddad’s or even on your way to the airport, when, just at the least helpful moment, just when you don’t need to hear it...

“I need a wee wee!”

Panic-stricken, you have to make a split decision. Do I slam on the anchor and reverse back to the lay-by one hundred yards gone or thrust the accelerator through the floor to get to the next possible safe place to stop before the flood gates burst?

You might think we are the only members of the animal kingdom to go through this coming of age initiation ceremony, but you’d be wrong!

Early this morning whilst hanging out the washing (I’m a new man – apparently), I was quite stunned to see a pile of “clotted water” dumped unceremoniously in the corner of the deflated children’s paddling pool, that I still hadn’t gotten around to putting away since the end of our torturously short summer last year.

Whilst pegging out various pairs of pants I was instantly transported back to two simultaneous locations: my childhood and my favourite part of the English GCSE that I used to teach – Seamus Heaney’s Death of a Naturalist, to which I shall treat you now; I hope you enjoy it.

Death of a Naturalist

All year the flax-dam festered in the heart
Of the townland; green and heavy headed
Flax had rotted there, weighted down by huge sods.
Daily it sweltered in the punishing sun.
Bubbles gargled delicately, bluebottles
Wove a strong gauze of sound around the smell.
There were dragon-flies, spotted butterflies,
But best of all was the warm thick slobber
Of frogspawn that grew like clotted water
In the shade of the bank. Here, every spring
I would fill jampotfuls of the jellied
Specks to range on window-sills at home,
On shelves at school, and wait and watch until
The flattening dots burst into nimble-
Swimming tadpoles. Miss Walls would tell us how
The daddy frog was called a bullfrog
And how he croaked and how the mammy frog
Laid hundreds of little eggs and this was
Frogspawn. You could tell the weather by frogs too
For they were yellow in the sun and brown
In rain.

Then one hot day when fields were rank
With cowdung in the grass and the angry frogs
Invaded the flax-dam; I ducked through hedges
To a coarse croaking that I had not heard
Before. The air was thick with a bass chorus.
Right down the dam gross-bellied frogs were cocked
On sods; their loose necks pulsed like sails. Some hopped
The slap and plop were obscene threats. Some sat
Poised like mud grenades, their blunt heads farting.
I sickened, turned, and ran. The great slime kings
Were gathered there for vengeance and I knew
That if I dipped my hand the spawn would clutch it.

Seamus Heaney

I had this delightful little poem going in my head as I hung the last pair of odd socks that were forlornly hoping to be reunited with their dry counterparts in the airing cupboard. Standing back to admire my handiwork I spied the ideal container to use to safely move the spawn to my little water feature – a cheap plastic ersatz half barrel that is wonderfully unkempt with lots of algae and a daring blue water iris tempting a frosty fate by poking its tender little green spears above the water level, the sides of which are coated in acres of green sustenance for the anticipated arrivals.

Safely transferred I mused the scenario of the male frog clamped to the female, driving their froggy equivalent of my 806, her complaining to him, “Are we there yet?” Then sending him into overdrive, by declaring “I need to spawn!”

I can see him now screeching up beside the flat blue paddling pool.

“Ere you go luv, this’ll do!”

As they say in the frog world, “When you gotta spawn, you gotta spawn!”