Leaf Castings Anyone?

[pamnock]

Does anyone here do concrete leaf castings? I saw some at an arts festival recently and they were beautiful!

We had some extra concrete, so I sifted out the stones and tried doing a casting with a Hosta leaf. My first attempt didn't turn out too bad It was really easy and a lot of fun!

Real Hosta plant in the back, concrete leaf casting in the foreground.

Concrete leaf before painting (real Hosta leaf piece to the left).

Plaster casting Matthew did of a Hydrangea leaf.

Our tree frog wanted his photo taken also



Pam

 

[Sealy]

I don't do them but like them.
You did a great job Pam! I thought the casted one was a real one.. had to look closely.

I'm putting your tree frog on my er...bunny napping list
* I love frogs!( or frawgs as we call em here).


~Sealy

 

[pamnock]

Frogs are cool pets We have 2 tree frogs, a wood frog and a tiny spring peeper.

A few of our other "house pets" include a tarantula, anole, praying mantises, turtlesand stick insects. (As well as the more "normal" pets - dog, cat, fish, hamsters)

Here's a webpage with some of our creatures . . .

http://www.geocities.com/pamnock/creatures.html

Pam

 

[Michaela]

Oh my gosh Pam, that's amazing! :great:

Aww, cute froggie! hehe

 

[Sealy]

Very cool! I love the babies!! How cute is THAT?!?
Not too sure bout your hissing roach though ( shudder)

Couple of things I wanna know...
The Vietnamese Walking Stick & Praying Mantis...are they mounted under that glass? And if so, would that still qualify them as pets?

And.. do you ever fear the Tarantuala getting loose and eating the others?

How neat though... I bet they are all interesting to watch.

~Sealy

 

[pamnock]

Those are photos that I posted last year - but I was only counting live pets

The Vietnamese Stick in the photo died so I mounted it. The Indian on the rightwas live (but has since died - it was one of our original ones - they only live about 18 months).

We currently have about 15 live Indian Sticks.

The large praying mantis in the photo died last year, so we mounted that also.

We currently have 4 live mantises.

We don't currently have any hissing cockroaches, but I'll probably get another one soon.

Hopefully, we'll have time to get going on another butterfly project. Matthew raised a dozen monarchs last year.

The tarantula is well fed, so has no desire to get out and eat everyone else

Pam

 

[pamnock]

Wow - can't believe I forgot to mention my "big helper" on the computer (she attempts to destroy my mouse and keyboard while I'm trying to work).

Miss Suzy Q

 

[Crystalballl]

Oh my goodness. I'm seriously jealous. First of all the leaf castings are amazing. I've never done them before, but it looks totally neat!!

But I am loving the tree frog!!!!! I am a total froggy nut (that and Turtles!!) Where do you get a tree frog?? I'd love to have a pet one. But I don't know how to take care of them. You can PM if you'd like, I'd love to hear a bit about them instead of me taking over your post here

Thanks a bunch,

Crystal

 

[polly]

I love your tarantula, i have always wanted to hold one, and your turtles i love turtles and tortoises we went to see the giant ones in Mauritious when we were on honeymoon ( i liked them so much we went twice )

Do you ever manage to get time for yourself with all those animals Pam?

And i love your leaf casting they would look great dotted round the garden

 

[pamnock]

polly wrote:

Do you ever manage to get time for yourself with all those animals Pam?

And i love your leaf casting they would look great dotted round the garden

All our babies come first

Everything is set-up for easy maintenance and is well maintained - just like my rabbitry Matthew also helps keep up on everything.

Great idea about putting the leaf castings around the garden - I can't wait to do more!

Pam

 

[Leaf]

Those really are beautiful!

I'd love to try it, but wouldn't know where to begin.

A few months ago I bought a rubber type mould for a bird feeder (hands cupped together to hold seed, with a small bird on it) and I don't have any idea how to use that, even.

Eventually I'll get the nerve to try it out, I'm just very nervous about ruining the mould itself.

 

[polly]

Yeah they do look nice over here you can buy paving stones with different leaf designs on them and they look great but even better if you can make your own

 

[clarzoo]

Wow! Pam, those look amazing! I couldn't tell that there was a cast hosta leaf until I reread and stared at your post for a while, lol!! Amazing!

What are you going to do with them?


I love your tree frog, he looks like he's smiling. I am just about to add a few Poison Dart Frogs to my zoo. I can't wait! I've been working on building their vivariums over the last month or so.

 

[seniorcats]

Beautiful job Pam. We have done some using ferns and use them as headstones in our pet cemetary.