briarhide - Tumblr blog

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These chicken stickers are Eggman-approved!! He just wishes I'd make some with eggs on. Or hedgehog-obliterating robots. Get your homemade, free-range chicken stickers here!!

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Griffon vulture harpy.

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More Lightning Ferret design bits from my sketchbook

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Showing my glass pen in action and my inking process. (Also this is my first time doing narration in a video, I had to take many takes for this😅)

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Sketches before work.

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Adding shading to Lightning Ferret!

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Painting Lightning Ferret!

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Some wolves from my sketchbook.

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ANNOUNCEMENT!📢 My new shop website is live!! Along with a bunch of new items in it! Giving this a try to see if this works for me as an alternative to Etsy, and if it proves successful, it might be where I am going to be selling my work from now on. The address is here at www.briarhideillustration.shop !Do feel free to have a browse! (Credit for the jazzy music in this hastily-put-together slideshow: 'Piano Sway' by Jay Man - OurMusicBox https://www.our-music-box.com)

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Little sneak peek at one of the items I’m stocking in my new online shop (launching tomorrow all being well).

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Just to say, I’m currently working on trying out a whole new shop site! Watch this space for its launch along with a bunch of new items!

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Irish hares.

Although there are three species of rabbits and hares in Ireland, the Irish hare is the only one that is truly native; the other two were originally introduced by humans. Although it is classed as a subspecies of the mountain hare, some recent studies into the genetics of Irish hares suggest that it may be distinct enough to perhaps be considered an entirely different species.

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Not an art post, but thought I’d share this fundraiser I found to help these children and their mother get out of Gaza to live with their father in Ireland. Would be wonderful if they could make it here to safety.

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Red foxes, again using some of the photos I took at Wild Ireland animal sanctuary as a reference.

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Ink and watercolour bears, inspired by photos I took of a female brown bear during a recent visit to Wild Ireland animal sanctuary.

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I’m 26 today! Here’s a really tiny very rare self-portrait

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Wolverines from my sketchbook.

Armed with long claws, powerful jaws, pungent anal scent glands and with stories of them fighting off animals much bigger than themselves (including wolves and bears), wolverines have a reputation for being highly formidable, aggressive animals. Some unflattering other names for them include ‘glutton’, ‘nasty cat’, ‘stink bear’ and ‘woods devil’.

This is kind of a pity though, as there actually isn’t any documented evidence of wild wolverines ever attacking a human, and actually don’t even attack other large carnivores all that often either, contrary to popular belief—in general, they’d much rather just avoid conflict unless necessary (though I’ll admit their big teeth are fun to draw!).

Their so-called ‘gluttonous’ behaviour may be explained by the fact that food sources where they live can be scarce, especially in winter, so when they come across a meal they gorge themselves as much as they can, in order to sustain their energy and fat reserves.

The wolverine used to roam over many areas of Europe and North America, but now are only restricted to more remote areas of northern Europe, western Russia, northern Canada and the US state of Alaska, with just a handful of populations outside this state. Hunting and trapping for fur has played a toll on their numbers, as well as habitat loss, but a more current threat is climate change; mother wolverines need deep snow to birth their kits, and are just generally best-suited to colder climates and the ecosystems within them. As more people encroach into northern wildernesses, wolverines are also less likely to reproduce and will retreat further and further away from their normal hunting spaces.

So overall, wolverines aren’t really quite so ferocious as they’re made out to be, but just regular little creatures doing their best to survive in what little is left of the ancient wildernesses that they call home.