Centenary of AA Ireland - 55c Stamp

On 14 October, 2010 An Post issued a stamp to commemorate the Centenary of the Automobile Association Ireland (AA).

The AA started in Ireland in 1910, just as motoring was becoming popular with more and more cars appearing on the Irish roads. Its first meeting was held at offices on College Green, in Dublin City Centre. When the AA began in Ireland, the country had nearly 90,000km of roads, but only 7,870 registered motor vehicles, a number which soon rapidly increased. Within a year of the Association's establishment in Ireland, 4,000 road signs had been installed.

During World War I and the Irish War of Independence, private motoring virtually stopped, but in 1924, two years after the Irish Free State came into being, the AA was revived. It issued the first road book of Ireland in 1931, and then in 1938, started another extensive road signposting scheme. By 1950, the organisation had 19,200 members.

In 1998, the AA became the first major organisation in Ireland to offer its members a free mobile phone. Two years later, AA launched its websites which are used regularly for route maps and traffic reports. Today, AA Ireland offers its customers a wide variety of services at home and abroad, as the organisation is now an essential 'companion' for so many motorists all over the country, its membership figures today exceed 600,000.

The stamp and first day cover were designed by Q Design and feature a photograph of an AA patrolman in full uniform giving the traditional AA salute.

New WWF postage stamps by Estonia

Estonian Post has issued four new postage stamps featuring the great crested newt.

The stamps were designed by Lembit Lohmus. FDC and four maxicards are also available.

The great crested newt (Triturus cristatus) is a species in the class of Amphibia, the order Caudata and the family Salamandridae. It lives in North and Central Europe in territories lying north of the Alps and the Danube. In Estonia the great crested newt mainly lives on the continent and is more numerous in Southeastern Estonia. An adult newt can grow up to 18 cm long, the female being slightly shorter than the male. The colour of the great crested newt depends on its living environment, but it is usually dark - black, brownish or grayish on the back and yellow or orange with dark patches underneath. The skin is rough like that of the toad. During the mating period the male develops bluish white stripes on the sides of the tail and a relatively high crest, which stops at the stump of the body and has given the name to the species. Females get a narrow yellow line down the spine, but they have no crest. The great crested newt prefers as its habitat forest lakes with no fish in them, ponds or pools, but can be found also in cultural landscapes with large rive valleys. The great crested newt is a protected species in Estonia.

U.N. Year of Biodiversity stamps

The United Nations Postal Administration (UNPA) is issuing two New York definitives on the theme "International Year of Biodiversity". These stamps will complete the set of six definitives on the topic, as two Geneva and two Vienna definitives were issued in April of this year on the same theme. A souvenir card will also be issued.

The United Nations declared 2010 to be the International Year of Biodiversity. The purpose of the International Year is to raise awareness of the importance of biodiversity and the consequence of its loss.

Magyar Posta wins PostEurop 2010 EUROPA Competition

PostEurop has announced the winning stamp to be the entry from Magyar Posta (Hungary Post) which featured the storybook illustrations of the Hungarian Kossuth Prize winning graphic designer Karoly Reich. The designs of the stamps, the border and the first day cover captured moments from the infamous story of the little bear much loved by Hungarian readers, Vackor.

The close first-runner of the EUROPA Stamp competition went to Posta Slovenije, postal operator from Slovenia and finally, the second-runner up of the EUROPA Stamp competition went to Hrvatska posta (Croatia).

The EUROPA stamp best design competition is a yearly online event in which the result is announced during the Plenary Assembly. The first competition took place in 2002. All official EUROPA stamp issues can enter the competition. Web viewers and PostEurop members are invited to vote for their favorite stamps.

PostEurop's Stamps and Philately Working Group selects the EUROPA stamp theme for each year. This year the theme is "Children's books".

Insect stamp release by Canada Post

Canada Post continues its beneficial insect series with five more of nature's tiny helpers: the paper wasp, the assassin bug, the large milkweed bug, the margined leatherwing and the dogbane beetle.

According to designer Keith Martin of the Vancouver-based Signals Design Group, this stamp project provided the chance to "unleash a new bug fest," as he so enthusiastically puts it. Martin speaks of the insects with an energy that is keenly reflected in the stamps. "Try as I might, I could not get these guys to behave!" he playfully laments of the infestation of insects that squirm across both the pane and the first day cover.

"The more I thought about bugs, the more I delighted in their seeming lack of a 'right side up,'" Martin explains. To capture this peculiar trait, he positioned them in a variety of orientations. He continues, "I also wanted to touch on the contrast between the first issue, which focused on insects often spotted in the sky, and this one, which is centered on plant and ground-dwelling bugs." The leafy, garden-inspired backgrounds of the stamps speak to this feature.

Martin adds that light plays a special part in the design. "The choice of lighting was as integral as deciding which background to use in each stamp. For example, a strong light source on the assassin bug allows its cast shadow to define it against the active background of that stamp, while the flat light on the large milkweed bug creates a parallel between the flower's abstract triangular forms and the shapes of the bug's markings."

Five special philatelic packs including your choice of corner blocks (UL, UR, LL, LR) of all five denominations, plus a corner set containing all four corner blocks of each denomination, are available from the National Philatelic Centre. Availability is limited.