The BC Museums Association is posting the following on behalf of one
of our members, the Gabriola Museum. If you can assist, please
reply to the email address at the end of the forwarded  message.
Thank you.     Barb Dexter, BCMA, Dogwood Regional Network.

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Gabriola Island, on Canada's west coast, has about 70 known petroglyphs,
ranging in size from 10cm square to 1m x 2m.  Almost all are pecked in
sandstone.  Most were moss-covered until the late '70s.  Now that they
are exposed, they are suffering from weathering, tourist rubbings and
traffic, and (in a few cases) vandalism.  Because they are scattered
all over the island, the cost of protecting them would be high.

The Gabriola Museum has made latex moulds of three, and cast cement
reproductions from them, with fairly good results, at a cost of about
$65 each.  We hope to do the rest in the next year or two (funds and
weather permitting), and to put the casts outside the museum for viewing
and rubbings, hoping this will take some of the pressure off the originals.

We have thought of making an instructional videotape of the project,
for the benefit of anyone else faced with a similar situation.  Before
we undertake this, we need to know:

1.  Has this already been done?  (We found nothing on a library search.)

2.  Would there be enough interest in a videotape to make it worth doing?

Your responses to these two questions would help us decide.  Please send
your comments to me, NOT to the list.  I will post the results to the
list in a couple of weeks.

Thank you for your help.

Barrie Humphrey
Director, Gabriola Museum
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