Comparative oology

It's Easter so it has to be eggs! The egg was of course a symbol of renewal and rebirth long before it was adopted as a Christian symbol of the Resurrection. Celtic 'pagans' celebrated Ostara at the time of the vernal equinox with an emphasis on fertility.

Here I've assembled a selection of 'ova' that came to hand around the house. The egg box on the left contains our own hens' eggs that we eat every day (the blue ones were laid by Gretel the Araucana hen) and in front of it is a small bird's nest, incorporating sheep's wool and plastic twine, which holds two tiny replica eggs of species I cannot recall. The magnificent large blue-black egg comes from an emu (all the way from Kansas!) and in front of it is a well-camouflaged gull's egg resting in an old cork float (both found locally).

In the Russian lacquer egg cups are three white duck eggs which I have dyed by boiling them with onion skins. (I intended to colour some yellow with gorse flowers but did not have time.) Next to those are a wooden egg and another made of quartz or onyx, very cool to the touch. The foil-wrapped eggs are made of chocolate.

The book, whose title may be visible when viewed LARGE, is The Journal of the Museum of Comparative Oology. That's not a misprint for Zoology: Oology is the study of eggs. This strange volume comprises a series of bulletins dated 1919 to 1922 describing the activities of a dedicated society of egg collectors in Southern California. These scientific gents devoted their energies to collecting eggs in great quantities, taking not just the entire clutch but the nests as well, to be stored in sterile museum conditions. Looting and raiding nests seems shocking to us today when we strive to support and protect birds in their natural environment but it is a reminder of the intense passion that eggs are capable of stimulating. Just as well then that Easter celebrations nowadays channel the interest into chocolate and leave the wild birds alone.