#124 - BTS EXHIBITION 2016

My customary jet lag is finally shaken and I thought I'd file a report on the 31st annual BTS Exhibition while I have my first cup of coffee of the day.

31 years. It may be hard to believe, but the BTS is the world's oldest ongoing tarantula society and by far the best and most successful. The annual exhibition has been organized by Ray and Angela Hale for the past 25 years, and they do an absolutely brilliant job of making it better each year. The Hales are the backbone of the BTS. Ange has been responsible for our Head Office for quite some time, and Rayzor now sits as Vice Chairman of our great society.

Great photo by sukisuki.co.uk of Ray and Ange Hale. Such a lovely couple. Can't believe they have been married for 33 years. He must have married Ange when she was 7. They are responsible for the best arachnid exhibition in the world.

This was my 10th trip to the UK. My first was for the 2006 Exhibition, where I was actually a vendor. Yes, that's right. I didn't bring spiders, of course. Europe has always been the world power in arachnoculture with America not much more than a far distant imposter. But in 2005 I had launched my ARACHNOCULTURE magazine, and my stand at the 2006 event marketed subscriptions and back issues along with some American tarantula books (e.g., Marshall and Schultz). My own Tarantulas (Animal Planet Pet Care Library) wasn't published until 2011.

For as long as I have been aware of it, the BTS Exhibition has always been held in England's Midlands. This gives a central location for UK residents. In 2014, the Exhibition made a huge leap. It had grown continually over the years and traders from all over Europe were now showcasing their wares. Previous events were primarily held at schools. My first in 2006 was in a school gymnasium that had been used for years. However, with the 2014 Exhibition we hired Ricoh Arena, a first class venue and put on what was the best Exhibition yet. It is located in Coventry, which is in the Midlands, just south of Birmingham. There were some hiccups including using a second floor exhibit hall that necessitated using a freight elevator (or as they say, "lift"). I was in charge of running the traders up and down in the lift and I worked it so hard it finally broke. We ended up having to help late-arriving exhibitors up the stairs with their stuff. In 2015, we rented the larger exhibit hall on the ground floor of the Ricoh and put on what we thought was the show to end all shows. We didn't think we'd ever move elsewhere. However, the Arena had new owners and they attempted to extort us to resign for this year. They were politely told to fuck off.

So, Ray and Ange did what they've always done. They've busted their asses to make the BTS Exhibition the finest arachnid/invertebrate show. That's not my own hyperbole. People always talk about Hamm and Marbach in Germany, but every single European trader including the Germans tell us straight up that the BTS Exhibition is the best in the world. When we started at the Ricoh the Hales partnered up with Pandora Events who would help with the hotel bookings and such. Working with Pandora, Ray and Ange located the Warwickshire Exhibition Centre in Leamington Spa. Not as fancy and modern as the Ricoh, but even larger at 2200 square meters of exhibition space, the WEC proved to be the ideal venue. Attendees and traders alike preferred it to the Ricoh. The staff were brilliant and every single thing about the day from the parking to the food to the lighting to the access was superior to the Ricoh Arena. Our host hotel was the Holiday Inn Leamington Spa and it was a modern establishment that lived up to my upscale American standards. The 31st annual event was, by far, the most successful event for arachnoculturists and invertebrate dealers ever held. Until next year, that is... (The 32nd BTS Exhibition will be held at the same location on May 20, 2017).

This year I was entrusted with new duties. When Peter Kirk resigned as Journal Editor and the BTS Committee honored me with seceding Pete (and Richard Gallon before him), Peter also asked me to take on judging the Exhibition's competition and photographing the winning spiders, scorpions, photography, and both adult and children's artwork. So, in addition to 10 days worth of clothing, gifts for the Pennells and all the other stuff I had to haul overseas, I brought my 30 pound camera bag. Foolish, again. I should have just brought my macro rig. I used it to photograph the winning spiders and scorpion, but every other shot I took during the whole trip was taken with my iPhone 6S Plus. Anyway, I'll leave you with some of my favorite photos. I posted many of my own on my @exoticfauna Instagram. Many of the below were "borrowed" from other people (with photo credit given). If you haven't checked out my Instagram feed yet please do. There also have been some great images posted to the BTS Facebook Group.

The upcoming second issue of the BTS Newsletter will be a special issue devoted to the Competition. So those of you who are members will see both the winners and their entries. The Best in Show spider, which was a gorgeous Lasiodorides striatus owned by Britain Kitten, will also be featured on the annual membership card and bookmark.

This is a personal favorite. Mária of Macilaci Spiders, Hungary is lovely and always happy. She is such a great supporter of the BTS and her display is very professional with an incredible variety of tarantulas at exceptional prices. She (aka Maci) and her husband László (Laci) work with Mária's brother László (Dudu) who is seen here in the background doing a great photobomb. Laci took the picture. I'm sporting the new BTS international logo t-shirt. I surprised the family later at the hotel when I purchased a ticket to join the BTS envoy that is visiting Budapest in October. This will be the third year that Macilaci Spiders works in conjunction with TerraPlaza Budapest to bring BTS lecturers to Budapest. I won't be speaking this year, but I'm excited to see the beautiful city and spend time with my BTS friends.

My "niece" Brandon, daughter of my dearest friends Mark and Kim Pennell. She's holding one of the incredible plush spiders that were being offered by sukisuki.co.uk who took the photo of the Hales seen above.

This shot has become an annual tradition. These are the four badasses of the BTS Committee and why nobody gives us any lip. We try our best to look hard, but we're all sweethearts. Last year I ruined the pic with a smile and this year it was Ray. Left to right: Me, Lee Cole, Mark Pennell, Ray Hale. Here's a contest for you ... Put in the comments your guess for ranking us oldest to youngest. Bet nobody gets it...

Me best mate. This year Mark made a "selfie frame" for people to take a pic of themselves at the Exhibition. Here we are before the ride northeast to the Midlands. Mark is acting himself and I'm giving him the look of someone used to it. I'm repping one of my favorite bands, while he is repping Peter Kirk's side business, Precision Piercing.

Add caption

Speaking of mates, here are three more of my favorite Brits. This is the field team. On the outside are the bearded Andrew Smith and the clean shaven Paul Carpenter. I first traveled with them in 2006 to Costa Rica. Andrew and I had become fast friends a few years earlier when he lectured two years for the ATS (once in Carlsbad, once in Phoenix). In the middle is Guy Tansley who traveled with Andy and Paul to other places before the four of us had our field trip to Suriname in 2012. Guy, Paul and myself went to Sri Lanka in 2014 without Andy. Guy is another of my favorite people and, sadly, he didn't make it to the February lectures this year. So, this was the first time the four of us had all been together since the February 2014 BTS Lectures.

This final image was taken early on during vendor set up. It cuts off much of the room. For many pix of the event check out the BTS Facebook Group. Macilaci Spiders and SukiSuki have particularly good photo collections.

MAKE PLANS TO ATTEND NEXT YEAR!