We had a really interesting evening with Roy Hales and his wife Angela who gave us a presentation about the wildlife in Borneo.
Their particular hobby is the study of spiders and the rainforest in Borneo has a lot of different varieties including some brand new ones not before seen or therefore named.
They keep a huge collection in pots in a room in their house with dozens of specimens and look after and study them. They also run the British Tarantula Spider Society.
Roy's interest in spiders started when he was a boy when he found himself looking at a spider in its web (rather like Robert the Bruce) and he thought how beautiful and clever 'the little critter' was and so his lifetime hobby began. Then he met his future wife on a trip when she was studying tarantulas in some far of spot (most probably Borneo) and love and the spiders blossomed and have done so ever since.
As we have in our midst a devout arachnophobic (Vice Chairman Di Walker), there was a request that if a picture of a spider was going to be shown, a warning would be given so she could put a bag over her head. This was duly done. Roy also brought a large tarantula spider in a glass case which was actually a skin which had been shed. Tarantulas keep shedding their skins throughout their lives as they grow too big for them, not a lot of people know that!
So we heard a lot about spiders during the evening but we were also shown Roys pictures of many other examples of the wildlife of Borneo such as the Orangutan, which is sadly heading for extinction, mainly through lack of habitat to support it and females being shot when they stray onto the Palm Oil plantations which have been grown where the native forest has been cleared. Palm Oil is a big export business for Borneo as the world has a growing appetite for it.
However large parts of the Rainforest are protected by the Government as it is still home to very many sorts of wildlife including some as yet undiscovered. Roy showed us frogs, monkeys, bugs, squirrels and other rather strange creatures.
Our thanks to both Roy and Angela for a most entertaining evening.