Australia Post Stamps | SCM | Bugs and Butterflies | Collecting


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Cool Stuff About Stamps:

Why collect stamps?
How are stamps designed?
What stamp is that?
How are stamps printed?
Taking care of Stamps
Stamp Collecting Essentials
Other Cool Stuff to Collect
Stamp words - Glossary
More about stamps
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Taking care of Stamps

How to get stamps off envelopes carefully and into your album!

First cut around the stamp carefully, leaving some paper around the stamp so that you don't damage it
Place the stamp with the design face up in a bowl of warm water to soak the gum from the back of the stamp. Needs about 15 - 20 minutes.
Watch out for coloured envelopes because sometimes the coloured ink runs and can spoil the stamp
Using your fingers put the wet stamp on to a clean tea towel or a paper towel and then fold it over to cover the stamps.
Carefully place a heavy book on top so that the stamps won't crinkle when drying.
Leave the stamps until it's dry, then carefully place it in your album. Some collectors prefer to pick up stamps with tweezers to prevent any damage to the stamp.

Tools to use

Stamp tweezers are special tweezers because they have blunt ends so that they will not damage stamps. Stamp dealers and post offices sell them.
A magnifying glass will help you see small details. Did you know that all Australian stamps show the year the stamp was issued and often this is in very tiny figures that are 'tucked away' somewhere in the stamp design?
Some ultra serious collectors use a perforation gauge to measure the size of perforations on their stamps. Sometimes a reprint of a stamp design may have different perforations from the original.

Fact		Fact
A common insect in Australia, the Gum Moth is distributed throughout the Northern Territory, Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria where its habitat is forests and woodlands. The large fleshy caterpillar of the Gum Moth, which may grow to 120mm, is bright green with red and blue lumps topped with non-stinging hairs along the body.		The Emperor Gum Moth glues its eggs onto eucalypt leaves or peppermint tree leaves, which the large green caterpillar eats when it emerges. Birds are the main predator of the emperor gum caterpillar.