THE FOLLOWING IS A STATE OF THE WHALE SKELETON ADDRESS

by Lee Post

Now I'm losing track of how many weeks it has been. This was week five and it rapidly flew by. Art got the rib framework welded up, the ribs were attached to the metalwork, the scapulae attached to the ribs, the chevrons figured out, more silicone was added to the vertebrae, and the skull is making great progress thanks to Cheyenne and Wes. It is being cleaned-consolidated-repaired and well on its way to being a beautiful functional skull after twelve years of hanging outside.

We had some new volunteers come and spend part of a day doing some incredibly tedious cleaning of mud out of pores of the skull, thanks Skeeter and Ginger. Laurel from Mexico left with some fresh inspiration for her big Sperm Whale Project after helping for a week. Esther continues to be the Silicone Queen doing the finishing coats and others continue to come and go.

What's left is a list of lots of tedious little projects and a few big ones. The ribs will be going and coming again. Metal needs to be painted, bones need to be touched-up and colored, final layer of silicone is going on most places, chevrons will be attached, flipper hardware will be installed and then the big project is getting the skull done and hanging hardware fabricated.

More and more people are coming to visit. Occasionally someone stays for the day to help. We had lots of cruise ship visitors coming by on Saturday. The whale continues to generate it own waves of excitement.