Berry Street Ups the Ante

Recently I received an email from a source at the Moorabool News suggesting the the residents of Berry street had upped the ante by creating a very large and very impressive weathervane.

Velislav and I immediately headed to Berry street to investigate. We found two weathervanes. The first had obviously been there for a while. It was modest in size and featured a cow.


The cow-motif weathervane

The second was enormous. A great big decorative cockerel. Very ornate. The new weathervane was sitting on top of a decorative arch at the entry to a garden. We knocked on the door of the house to offer our congratulations but no one was home.


The Berry Street Cockerel by Norman Bainbridge - assembled from recycled elements

I later learned that the weathervane belonged to Norman and Heather Bainbridge. Norman told me that it is an assembled, recycled piece. The post is an off-cut from a plastic drainage pipe. A "Lazy Susan" provided the spnning platform for the bird. Norman bought the cockerel. It was made from an old oil drum by street kids in the West Indies as part of a development program.

Norman says "The basic idea was to stick the traditional cockrell on an arrow and to prove that it doesn't cost a fortune to make a reasonable looking [weathervane]". All in all, the project cost Norman just $60. It's pretty amazing.