{"id":848,"date":"2009-08-16T17:23:18","date_gmt":"2009-08-16T17:23:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/2009\/08\/chronicles-of-middle-earth-part-eight-flora-and-fauna.html"},"modified":"2009-08-16T17:23:18","modified_gmt":"2009-08-16T17:23:18","slug":"chronicles-of-middle-earth-part-eight-flora-and-fauna","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2009\/08\/chronicles-of-middle-earth-part-eight-flora-and-fauna.html","title":{"rendered":"Chronicles of Middle Earth Part Eight: Flora and Fauna"},"content":{"rendered":"

Flowers and animals add a lot to a film like the Narnia tales or LOTR
\nand Peter Jackson had lots of critters and plants to choose from. Three
\nstars to whoever can first identify the following flowering plant.<\/p>\n

\"NZ<\/a><\/span>
This is yellow gorse, which belongs in the UK, particularly Scotland, but is invasive in New Zealand.   <\/p>\n

The
\ncreatures of Middle Earth include horses, dragons, wargs and oliphants; in the Narnia tales you have talking beavers and a faun with goat legs. <\/p>\n

Alas, Kiwiland
\nhas only one native mammal — a bat.  All other mammals now residing there were imports, most of which, like skoats and deer cause ecological problems for the natives.<\/p>\n

One of the great oddities is a marsupial called a
\npossum in New Zealand.  Unfortunately, this invasive species now numbers in the 70 millions.  How do you combat such numbers?  Trap them for their ultra soft fur from which wonderful
\ngloves, hats, and scarves are made.  remember that this possum is nothing like
\nthe American opossum, indeed it looks more like a little fox or raccoon.  In combination with wool
\nfrom Merino sheep its fur is made into the most popular of ‘wool’
\nproducts — possum merino.  We bought hats and gloves for a reason — we didn’t come prepared for the chilly July weather!  Hobbits would have loved possum-merino wear.   <\/p>\n

\"possum.jpg\"<\/a><\/span>  <\/p>\n

There
\nare birds in Middle Earth, such as this purple
\ngallinule, but they sadly didn’t make the casting call because they are not English critters such as Lewis or Tolkien imagined. <\/p>\n

\"NZ<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n

Even the national bird of Kiwiland failed to garner a part.  Few are left in the wild despite many efforts to raise them in captivity and release them.  We were mesmerized by these harmless, nocturnal creatures who were being carefully reared at a sanctuary in Queenstown.
\"kiwi.jpg\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Maybe
\nin The Hobbit, a kiwi could crawl through the dragon’s cave and
\nmake an Alfred Hitchcock like cameo appearance.  I think I shall suggest this to the new director, Guillermo del Toro.<\/p>\n

\"NZ<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Because
\nof the temperate climate and the prevalent volcanic soil almost any
\nplant imaginable grows here.  It is a botanist’s paradise (which is one
\nreason my wife enjoyed it so much).  Even proteas, quite famous in South
\nAfrica, grow here.  The vegetation is so lush in various
\nplaces it is no wonder they had such fat sheep and Hobbits in
\nMiddle Earth.<\/p>\n

Flowers
\ndo come in for occasional use in these wonderful films, and there are
\nplenty to choose from.  I like this one, a form of aloe, a healing
\nplant.<\/p>\n

\"NZ<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

One feels bad that Middle Earth never celebrated Christmas.  In New Zealand, of course, Christmas comes in the middle of summer.  Heralding its approach, the pohutakawa tree puts forth beautiful red blossoms. 
\"NZ<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

In our next post we must explore the physical geography of the two islands of Middle Earth. <\/div>\n

<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Flowers and animals add a lot to a film like the Narnia tales or LOTR and Peter Jackson had lots of critters and plants to choose from. Three stars to whoever can first identify the following flowering plant. This is yellow gorse, which belongs in the UK, particularly Scotland, but is invasive in New Zealand.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nChronicles of Middle Earth Part Eight: Flora and Fauna - The Bible and Culture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2009\/08\/chronicles-of-middle-earth-part-eight-flora-and-fauna.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Chronicles of Middle Earth Part Eight: Flora and Fauna - The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Flowers and animals add a lot to a film like the Narnia tales or LOTR and Peter Jackson had lots of critters and plants to choose from. 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A graduate of UNC, Chapel Hill, he went on to receive the M.Div. degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. from the University of Durham in England. He is now considered one of the top evangelical scholars in the world, and is an elected member of the prestigious SNTS, a society dedicated to New Testament studies. Witherington has also taught at Ashland Theological Seminary, Vanderbilt University, Duke Divinity School and Gordon-Conwell. A popular lecturer, Witherington has presented seminars for churches, colleges and biblical meetings not only in the United States but also in England, Estonia, Russia, Europe, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Australia. He has also led tours to Italy, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. Witherington has written over thirty books, including The Jesus Quest and The Paul Quest, both of which were selected as top biblical studies works by Christianity Today. He also writes for many church and scholarly publications, and is a frequent contributor to the Beliefnet website. Along with many interviews on radio networks across the country, Witherington has been seen on the History Channel, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, The Discovery Channel, A&E, and the PAX Network.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/author\/bwitherington"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/199"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=848"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}