Isle of Man 2 pence 1979 - Manx Shearwater

The coin's story

In 1976 the Isle of Man replaced the designs of its first decimal series with a new series: each reverse shows the map of the island with a local subject. On the 2 pence coin, Barry Stanton engraved a Manx shearwater in flight above the island. This seabird bears the name of the island in English, Manx shearwater, attested since 1835: it refers to the large colony on the Calf of Man, the islet south of the island, where up to 10,000 young birds a year were harvested in the seventeenth century. This colony was wiped out at the end of the eighteenth century by rats from a shipwreck. A great migrant, the shearwater spends the winter off Brazil and Argentina, more than 10,000 km from its colonies. Coins of this type were struck by the Pobjoy Mint from 1976 to 1979. In 1979, the last year, they received die letters (from AA to AH) identifying the striking dies.