I had this planned as a hatchday gift for a special someone for well over 6 months. I bought the materials within a week, and then spent the next 5.75 or so months thinking about it, and only just now brought the image to reality here in the last three days. The whole thing was made from scratch, and was a major experiment for me, since I've never made anything like this before. Come to think of it, the last thing I actually constructed from raw materials would have to be a birdhouse in the 7th grade! Made of leather and wax-coated thread, held together with said thread and some leather-cement glue stuff. The collar is 1.5 inches wide and I forget how long. I used shoe polish on the scales in an attempt to make them shiny, and it worked better than I had hoped! Everything leather was cut and made from scratch.

( please excuse the crappy quality. I don't have a camera save my 2.0mp webcam >.-.<; )