IN yesterday's glorious weather, he would surely have preferred to have been standing guard over the sun-baked fields. But the scarecrow above will be among others spending a few days indoors as part of an exhibition at Beck Isle Museum, Pickering. The guardians of farmers' crops are being honoured in the museum's first scarecrow festival - and people are being invited to submit their own exhibits.

Museum chairman Gordon Clitheroe said members of the management committee had already completed their own design and schools in the Ryedale area were also being encouraged to enter their scarecrows.

The exhibition will run from May 3 to 6.