SCARECROWS TAKE OVER DORSET VILLAGE
A week-long festival celebrating the art of the iconic rural scarecrow has been held in the Dorset villages of Loders and Uploders.
This is the fifth such annual event and it caricatures people both living and dead!
The Queen as a scarecrow!
Spaceman Tim Peake, film character Harry Potter and two Davids have been the subjects of some works that is David Bowie to David Attenborough.
Village residents certainly have been creative with their masterpieces dotted around the villages. Wherever you look you can see them sitting on walls, hanging off bushes or even loitering on street corners.
Isambard Kingdom Brunel scarecrow with young admirer.
The residents this year were challenged to come up with Scarecrows with the theme Great Britons.
Whether Katie Price falls into that category is one question but most people would seem that the Queen and Emmeline Pankhurst definitely do fall into that class!
Spaceman Tim Peake made it back to earth!
Previous themes have included poppies, fairy tales and in the garden.
Driving through the village you may see things like a group of union jack waving scarecrows from the disused railway bridge dressed in red white and blue.
Admiral Nelson scarecrow.
The villages of Loders and Uploders are a few miles north east of the West Dorset town of Bridport and around 30 residents entered the competition this year.
With weird and wonderful stuffed figures adorning the area for a week each year and they are judged in a competition. The winning scarecrow award is much coveted in the area.
David Attenborough and Edward Jenner.
Loders was mentioned in the Doomsday Book and listed as Lodres. A Benedictine priory was established and the monks were thought to have introduced cider making to Dorset. Cider can be sampled today served in the local pub ‘The Loders Arms’ and in Uploders you will need to call in at ‘The Crown’ for that cooling apple drink!
Harry hanging off a hedge. Harry Potter in flight!
Definitions for Scarecrow ‘an object made to resemble human form designed to scare birds from fields where crops are grown.’ Or could be ‘a person generally badly dressed odd looking or rather skinny!’
As well as her Majesty noted historical figures include Brunel, Nelson, Alfred the Great, Edward Jenner and Sir Francis Drake.
