Monday 28 May 2012

Re-constructing a whale.

For once, today, I was up to date with chores, animal husbandry and gardening so a day off was in order.

At the top of the hill we have one of the best campsites in Scotland with long views down the Sound to Ben Tallaidh, sea eagles soaring and terraced pitches where the campers don't look out on to each other. This is an alternative enterprise for the Crofter, MD and toilet cleaner Trevor who needed  a hand today to re-construct a Cuvier's whale skeleton, a good project for a day off.


The skeleton had been arranged across the wall of Trevor's "Whalebone Bothy" but was taken down so that Stephen French (Artist) could paint the outline of the whale as a piece of graffiti. 

Today's job was to re-arrange the skeleton, strung together with a steel cable over the graffiti. So I offered my unskilled help which mainly amounted to holding the vertebrae while Trevor fixed them to the wall.











This is the kit Trevor retrieved from mass of stinking, maggot infested blubber and bluebottles. Its now nice and clean, dry and bleached by the sun.




















Juggling the bones.


















3.30pm its not quite finished but we'd had enough by then, still some serious tweaking to do to get the right curve and flow of the spine.









This could be the view from your tent. Yellow Flag irises are a flamboyant sight of early summer here in the Highlands, great swathes of them cover the wetland, ditches and pond margins.

Its not so popular in Canada and the W. United States where it is considered an invasive weed on a par with bracken.

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