Tuesday 3 June 2014

more post and a lot of skulls... coming soon!

hi guys, im sorry i havent been able to make any posts in the last year, i discovered the joys of full time employment, and forgot all about the joys of blogging, however, this is about to change, as i have got four, i repeat four crates of different skulls to photograph and post up. keep watching this space.

many thanks,
the suffolk bone guy

Saturday 1 June 2013

The gnawed badger skull

The gnawed badger skull

If you think about it, there is very little in the way of calcium available in the wild, which means that most calcium dependent critters have to resort to some odd ways to find it. The most common ways of finding it in the wild are snail shells, and bones.  If you find any bones in grassland or woods, chances are, they will be nibbled slightly where rodents have been at them. Just like this badger skull that I found near an abandoned badger set.

As you can see, the sagitarial crest, eye orbits and upper jaws have all been completely or partially gnawed off, and several small holes have been chewed through to the brain pan.
You don’t see these very often, as once the damage is done, the skulls can crumble, and even if they are found, not many people keep them, as they just look like really damaged, broken skulls that no one wants.


This is only the second gnawed skull I have found, the other one being the ancient sheep skull ( see article farm animals 4 when i get around to putting it up) but I hope to find more, as they are totally unique.

Saturday 11 May 2013

Farm animals 2


Farm animals 2

Hey everyone, this week, I thought I would show you another of my farm themed animal skulls, a ram. This guy is huge, and looks very good as pride of place in any photo or display, as, even though its far from the biggest, it is well bleached ( naturally by the sun) and symmetrical.

As you can see, it only has horn cores, not the keratin sheaths ( the same stuff that hair, nails and hooves are made of) as these are not fixed, and can slide on and off once the animal is dead. (see any of my articles about bird skulls, they generally have slide on beak sheaths)
also, its quite well bleached, which is what happens when bone sits in the sun, and is dried out by it, with only a few slightly dark patches, probably from contact with the ground or leaves sitting on it.



This skull was kindly gifted to me by Emma Kerridge, the chief education officer at Lackford Lakes, a nature reserve that is run by Suffolk wildlife trust, and where I volunteer on occasion. Emma does a lot of great work, creating workshops and activity days for children aged four onwards, and is privileged to be gifted with many skulls by members of the staff team, and donations from the public for use in displays, and occasionally we do trades if she wants a specific skull for a themed activity day.  Check out their website for dates and fantastic nature photos.

http://www.suffolkwildlifetrust.org/reserves/lackford-lakes

Wednesday 24 April 2013

A crocodile head through the post.


A crocodile head through the post.

When I got home from work today, there was a pair of boxes waiting for me on the doorstep, which is always exciting. One contained my new original Bon Jovi “slippery when wet” 1986 ten track LP in it, the other contained a preserved crocodile head, that I swapped a Roe deer stag skull for.

My initial observations, whilst unpackaging it on the kitchen table whilst humming along to “you give love a bad name” was wow. I’m really happy with this swap, as it looks fantastic, and while I’m really into skulls, I do like taxidermy (stuffed animals) a fair bit too. Its really good quality word, and the resin used to seal the scales has given it a wet, lifelike look, as if it has just emerged from some dark pond. While these heads are fairly common, a by-product of the swamp culls, and often sold to tourists in America, I’m sure not many have made their way to the UK, so its definitely a good addition for the collection.
I just wonder what the postman would say if he knew what it was he had delivered!


My thanks today to Ryan Pettit of Bristol for emailing me and offering a swap, this article is dedicated to you dude. As always, feel free to get in touch if you have any questions, corrections or deals to offer.

Wednesday 17 April 2013

Fresh find today


Fresh find today, a swan skull (incomplete)





I went for a walk with the dog after work today, and decided to follow a river I haven’t travelled for some time, and I hit the jackpot, a new species for the collection, a swan. I actually found quite a few bones, but no feathers, which means it had been there a long time. This is the first bird larger than a duck that I have added to my collection, and I am quite excited about its size, as, even without the complete braincase, it is six inches in length.



These photos were taken as soon as I got home, which is why its still a little grubby,  however, as bird bones are so light and weak (to help them fly) they are very hard to clean, which is why I have not cleaned it to make it nice and bright. With most skulls I give them a good wash/clean, and with some I give them a dose in chemicals to whiten them. At some point in a later article, ill go through a step by step guide to cleaning and whitening skulls.

For now, I’m just happy to have a cool new find to add to the shelves.

My cigar box of delights… #1


My cigar box of delights…

Over the years, I have been given many small, fragile or plain odd items, which I keep separate from the rest of my collection in a wooden case once used as a case for fifty finest Cuban cigars but which now contains:

Small bags of rat, mouse shrew and vole skulls from owl pellets
A carved piece of deer antler
An articulated mouse skeleton (homemade, again, from an owl pellet)
An amulet of deer fur
A loose fox jaw with every bone still in place
A jar of assorted loose teeth
A pair of huge cow teeth
A large and slightly scary pair of deer incisors (the hidden weapon of muntjac)
The right half of the face of a cat skull.

The muntjac incisors, its hard to get a good frame of reference, but the unbroken one is three inches long.




The muntjac fangs inserted into a spare muntjac deer skull, you can see how big they are.

This is the fragment of cat skull as seen from the side, it was given to me by my friend Digby who saw it in his garden.

This it the cat skull fragment as seen from the front, I know it is from a cat, as I have two other cat skulls in my collection to compare it to.


All the teeth from the tooth jar, from top left we have red deer incisors, deer molars, fox molars
Middle row, two human teeth from a dentist with similar interests to mine, the rest are rabbit teeth,
Bottom row are all pig teeth ( see last weeks article)

This is the carved and polished piece of antler, showing the honeycomb build inside

This it the other side of the  carved horn showing the patterning and taper.



The fox jaw, like I said, it has all the teeth still in the mandible, which is quite a rare thing to see… check out that canine… its not clean yet, but its only mud, so ill probably use it in a future article on cleaning and whitening bones.




The cows teeth, its hard to get a frame of reference, but each of these is 2.5 inches long.


The deer fur amulet, this was a joke gift from a friend, who saw it at a stall at a wiccan/pagan/goth fair in Norfolk and thought of me… ( I don’t know what she was trying to say…

I hope you enjoyed todays article, and I intend to do a follow up article on the rest of the weird and wonderful items from the cigar box of mystery…

Friday 12 April 2013

How I nearly got a pig skull


How I nearly got a pig skull

Technically, I did have a pig skull, for a single night… I went with my family to a country fair, and at lunch, whilst enjoying a nice pork sandwich from a hog roast stall, I befriended the young guy working there and he gave me the head from the pig roast in a sealed black bag, having cut off most of the meat and telling me that boiling it would remove the remaining scraps.  Apparently, they give it away at most events as a lot of collectors and art students ask.

I took it home, stuck it in mums biggest pan and let it soak, and I was impressed at how well it worked, as I had heard that boiling can soften bone and cause it to rot. Then I left it outside to dry out overnight which was the last time I saw it…

When I got up the next morning, I went downstairs to find that the skull was gone, except for a jaw fragment and the thick bony chunk from the base of the skull where the spinal cord joins. My dog, smelling the skull, which still smelled like bacon from the hours it had spent on a hog roast, had eaten the  huge foot long skull!  She had gnawed on it for hours, wearing it away until it was nearly all gone. All I have left from what would have been one of my largest skulls, along with my horse and red deer stag skulls, is half a dozen molars (the chewing and grinding teeth)  and seven incisors (the cutting teeth in herbivores and carnivores).

 Those large molars are huge, bigger than a two pound coin,  which is probably why my dog couldn’t break them with her jaws. While most of the incisors are small, one is long and thin (bottom left), and was only showing by about a centimetre or so, with the other two inches hidden away in the jawbone.

So, despite all my hard work, I still don’t have a pig skull, but maybe this summer ill ask at a few events and see if I can get another one.

Next time, ill be showing my cigar box of delights, a wooden case filled with odd, small and fragile or rare pieces from my collection, so expect the unexpected and bizarre .