Post by Neillw001Post by CJBOn the BBC's Autumn Watch - Unsprung on Thursday evening they
mentioned that there was rumoured to be a colony of scorpions at Ongar
Station. Is this an urban myth or is there a really a colony there -
presumably escaped from some shipment or other? CJB.
I saw a piece on TV about this many years ago, though I think the were
at Blake Hall, not Ongar
Neill
I saw some film of them years ago, tiny little things that needed
UV ?? light to show them up, ISTR they were on the mortar between
bricks ?
Richard
******
From the Independent in 1995,
At its peak in 1971, 750 passengers were making the return trip. But even
then the track was hardly an economic proposition although the staff did
their utmost to drum up business. In 1965, an Ongar station foreman bought
five (harmless) European scorpions in a Camden pet shop and let them loose
in his goods yard. This formed the basis of one of the few scorpion colonies
in Britain, which became an attraction. The staff kept quiet about its real
origins, and encouraged speculation that it arrived in a banana van in the
1860s.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/theres-life-in-the-old-track-yet-1590512.html
AFAIK these are still there.