Endearing and Exotic animals

I realise, of course, that an animal I might consider exotic could be entirely commonplace for other people. It depends on your point of view. I have split the cards into my own personal view :)

My particular favourite of the endearing crowd is the one on the top left above.  The caption on the back reads "Which is the odd one out?"

It's not to say that exotic animals can't be endearing too. I love the snow monkeys from Japan, sitting in a thermal spring while the snow falls on their heads.

Top left and bottom right in this set are maxi-cards from Australia, with a corresponding stamp on the front of the card.

Animals of Africa

The shape of Africa made up of all the animals you might associate with the continent, from the largest elephant to the smallest insect.  Maybe not quite the smallest, but there are insects: butterflies and scorpions.  It's fun playing "spot the animal"!  This was sent from South Africa.

Fish on stamps

These two stamp cards are part of a larger series, British River Fishes, issued in 1983.  The other two which I no longer have were salmon and trout.

I've always said that collecting postcards, and in this case also stamp collecting, is educational.  In many parts of France, they fish and eat a river fish called "sandre".  They happily told me it was a hybrid of pike and perch but I see now from the stamp cards that in fact pike and perch are not only different species but different families.

So I investigated further and Wikipedia tells me that "sandre" or zander is called pike-perch only because it resembles both fish.  Apparently it's considered a delicacy in many places in Europe.  I can certainly vouch for it being very pleasant to eat.

Back to the present, and the task in hand. This is a post for Sunday Stamps, hosted by Violet Sky at "See it on a Postcard!"  As usual, click on the link to see some other fishy tales.

Welsh Sheep

I haven't received any Year of the Sheep stamps yet so I've had to settle for this PHQ stamp card.  It was issued as a Wintertime series in 1992.  The others in the series showed a fox, a deer, a redwing and a hare, but these are Welsh Mountain Sheep, a hardy breed.

This is a post for Sunday Stamps, in its new home at See it on a Postcard!

A cat at Christmas

By the look of him, I don't believe this cat is thrilled with his reindeer outfit but I think he looks really cute.  I'm just wondering whether I could find one for my cat...

Although it was sent from russia, it appears to be a card from a Chinese online publisher.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday hosted on Beth Niquette's blog, The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

Young roe deer

I travel home tomorrow, so I hope to post more regularly and with a little more to say for myself. The postcsrd showing the young deer came from Belgium.

Rural Pennsylvania

Cows in an idyllic setting.

Summer greetings

The beautiful outdoors in Finland.  The postcards from Finland so often have a wonderful seasonal feel about them.

Moose

Moose from Finland, from Ranua in Lapland to be precise.  I had to have a think about the plural of "moose" and it turns out to be "moose" and not mooses or anything to rhyme with geese.  It reminded me of the old joke about a zoo-keeper who wanted to order some animals for his zoo.  After tearing up several letters, he wrote, ""Dear Sir, Please send me a mongoose. And while you're about it, send me another one."

So here you have a moose, and another one.

Circus Festival

Once upon a time I had a stamp that matched this card from Monaco, or at least looked very similar, but by the time I found the card the stamp had long gone.  The Monte Carlo Circus Festival is an annual event.  Although It's many years since I've been to a circus, I think the artwork on this is wonderful.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday hosted on Beth Niquette's blog, The Best Hearts are Crunchy. Click on the button to join in.
 

Milking

Traditional style milking in the Alps of France. Traditional milk will no doubt be used to produce traditional local cheeses - Reblochon, Emmental and Beaufort perhaps.

Chinese horoscope

In the limited time I have these days, I searched high and low for any signs of the zodiac that I hadn't already posted.  I'm having to show the Year of the Horse stamp from Taiwan but at least this time it's on a different postcard, one that shows all the Chinese signs of the zodiac, running right to left, top to bottom:
Rat
Ox
Tiger
Rabbit
Dragon
Snake
Horse
Goat
Monkey
Rooster
Dog
Pig

We tend to think the signs are allocated to years in Chinese astrology but in fact they are also assigned to months, days and hours.  The year sign is how you appear to others, the month is how you are internally, the day sign is how you really are, and the hour denotes your secret self.

The card shows a paper cut-out silhouette. Chinese paper-cutting has been listed as a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage.

This is a post for Sunday Stamps, now hosted by Violet Sky at "See it on a Postcard!"

Two kittens are better than one

I'm not sure how much respect the photographers showed to the kittens, but there's safety in numbers.  It's a long time since my 8 year old cat could fit in a small jar but from time to time he forgets how much he has grown and squeezes himself into a small box.

Both these cards are from France, éditions agep.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday hosted on Beth Niquette's blog, The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

Salon d'Agriculture

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2013 was the 50th anniversary of the International Agricultural Show which is held, rather strangely to my mind, in Paris each year.  La Poste marked the 50th anniversary with a special issue of stamps and you can indeed see the Eiffel Tower in the background behind the cow carrying all those animals.

It is more than animals though, there are sectors for produce, gastronomy (this IS France we're talking about) crops, plants, nature and lifestyle, and agricultural services and professions.

This is a post for Sunday Stamps, now hosted by Violet Sky at "See it on a Postcard!"

A Killarney motor

If the writing at the bottom left is indecipherable, it says "A Killarney Motor.  Mostly propelled by good humour".  It is signed by the artist L. Anthony who produced a number of humorous cards set in Ireland. This one is unused but dates from some time before 1907.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday hosted on Beth Niquette's blog, The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

The Year of the Horse

Today has been a strange day.  For a week, for seven whole days, I haven't received a single postcard apart from a couple I had bought myself, but today produced ten all at once.

Four of these came from Finland, two from Germany and the others mixed.  Three were art cards, three were maps and the two above were horses.  As I don't mention horses in my profile on Postcrossing, I wonder if they are in response to the Year of the Horse.  The top one came from Finland and the bottom one showing Welsh ponies in England came from Germany.

The Royal Mail issued some horse themed stamps along with the stamp cards last month though I think that was coincidental and not for the Year of the Horse.

Three men - riding llamas

Three men hiking up a mountain with a telescope proved an impossible task so my offering has to be three men on llamas.

The card itself was sent to me from France three years ago with the only information on the reverse being "Hommes et lamas" from Editions du Désastre, Paris.  I spent quite some time trying to find out where in France these llamas might have been found without any success.

It wasn't until I remembered the clever Google search by image that I found an exact match, and via Getty Images I realised that the image originated in England.  Not at Ampthill House Llama Farm as suggested by Getty Images but at Wingfield Zoo, Ampthill also known as Ampthill Zoo.  There are further images of the same type at Ampthill Images website.

Apparently it was a private zoo maintained by Mr Wingfield from the late 1800s until after World War I.  He had all sorts of animals other than llamas roaming freely: camels, bison, pigs ostriches, all great attractions, especially as rides.  The animals were gradually transferred to Whipsnade Zoo (created 1926) when the estate zoo was gradually run down.

Further information about the town of Ampthill in Bedfordshire, including Ampthill House and the zoo, can be found on the Towns in Britain site.

This is a post for Sepia Saturday.  A click on the button will take you to the site.

Arctic Norway

After a remarkably mild winter (though also remarkably wet and windy), there was a chill in the air today.  It brought me to look at wintery postcards ad I came across the picture of a Sami girl with her reindeer.

The Sami are indigenous people in Norway and also the northern parts of Sweden, Finland, and Russia. Their main traditional occupation is herding reindeer but they also fish, trap for fur, and herd sheep.  The herding of reindeer is allowed only for Sami people.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday hosted on Beth Niquette's blog, The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

To be fleeced in Monte Carlo

Postcards of the Casino in Monte Carlo are commonplace and many are extremely similar, with only the flower display in the garden to distinguish the years.  This one, though, stands out because of the charabanc parked in front, either picking up or letting off its passengers.  The difference between the picking up and setting down isn't as obvious as it is in my second card below.

The charabanc driver is seated on the right of the vehicle which would indicate it's a British charabanc but there are no distinguishing marks that I can see.  I had hoped the fairly distinctive curved supports for the windscreen would help but after ploughing through an internet's worth of images, I am none the wiser.

I am not very proficient at dating cards from the fashions worn but I would guess that this may date from pre- First World War.

There are quite a few postcards using an image of sheep "before" and "after" visiting the Casino but this is the only one I own.

This is a post for Sepia Saturday

The Origin of the Species

Charles Darwin (1809-1882) was a British naturalist, best known for his work on his theory of natural selection. He wrote "On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection" after 20 years work following his visit to the Galapagos Islands on the HMS Beagle.  There he saw wild animals which had slightly different features on each of the islands.  The most well-known of these animals are the finches, tortoises and iguanas.

This series of stamps (I'm missing the 29p value) was issued in 1982 to commemorate the centenary of his death. He has been commemorated on a number of stamp issues - in 1999, 2006, and again in 2009.

This is a post for Sunday Stamps, now hosted by Violet Sky at "See it on a Postcard!"