Landscape mural draws attention to bats, birds, butterflies and bees / LJWorld.com

Archive for Tuesday, June 26, 2007

Visitors to Pendleton's Country Market, 1446 E. 1850 Road, make their way around an earthwork mural by crop artist Stan Herd on Monday morning. The earthwork, which was created to draw attention to the decreasing amount of wild pollinators, is a replica of a postage stamp depicting a southern dogface butterfly.

By Tricia Shelton - tshelton@sunflowerbroadband.com

June 26, 2007

Local farm invites you to get a "bee's-eye view" of special artwork

Nationally recognized crop artist Stan Herd brought his work to Pendleton's Country Market East of Lawrence. Enlarge video

National Pollinator Week is under way, and one Lawrence farm has a unique way of celebrating.

A 65-foot by 105-foot piece of crop art of a new postage stamp depicting a pollinator was unveiled Monday at Pendleton's Country Market, 1446 E. 1850 Road, east of Lawrence.

Crop artist Stan Herd of Lawrence led the project.

"This allows me to invest myself and my art with the people I work with," Herd said. "Then, I can make a difference."

The pollinators featured on the stamps are bats, hummingbirds, bumblebees and butterflies. Herd's crop art shows the southern dogface butterfly.

Chip Taylor, director of the Monarch Watch program at Kansas University, attended the unveiling.

"The North American Pollinator Protection Campaign convinced the (U.S.) Postal Service to create a beautiful set of stamps," he said. "I e-mailed Stan to ask if he would make the art."

Many volunteers helped Herd throughout the process and will continue to assist him in maintaining the site.

"I've been replanting flowers and raking around the sand," said volunteer Margarete Johnson, who works with Monarch Watch. "Plus, there's a lot of weeding. There are a lot of red-stemmed pigweeds, and I spend a lot of time picking those out."

Area 4-H club members volunteered to help with replanting flowers and doing cleanup after rain flooded about half of the artwork. Some of the flowers had to be replanted as many as four times.

Stewart Wakeman, a 4-H member, said he and his friends had been working to tidy up the artwork in order to complete necessary community service for 4-H programs.

"I can pick weeds, plant flowers and mulch," he said.

The North American Pollinator Protection Campaign is a California-based program that works to help protect resident and migratory pollinating animals.

6News intern Tricia Shelton can be reached at 832-6335.