Blue Ridge Discovery Center's Butterfly Poster

On April 10

th

, BRDC presented the Butterflies of Sullivan Swamp poster to Doris Halsey’s art class at Grayson County High School.

The poster is a culmination of efforts by these students to accurately represent butterflies documented last summer in Sullivan Swamp by other teams of kids through BRDC’s SiteSection program.

This is BRDC’s second poster collaboration with GCHS, last year’s being aquatic invertebrates of Wilson Creek, with our Fish Bugs program.

BRDC believes that through careful documentation, such as is found within the proud tradition of natural history illustration, participants gain insight and a closer connection to the targeted subjects, such as butterflies and stone flies.

We also believe that publishing their work helps bring attention and legitimacy to the wider community, while at the same time offering an educational tool that can be shared.

To that end, BRDC funds a support program called Blue Ridge Illustrated, designed and directed by Aaron Floyd, who brought this project to Doris Halsey.

Doris, in turn, provided a team of talented students and her classroom for exploration through art.

The students who participated are as follows:

Morgan Hall, Maria Rodriguez, Skyler Osborne, Nicole Campanella, Elijah Day, Ray Hale, Dylan Brannon (misspelled on the poster and our apologies), Jonah Smith (not mentioned on the poster, again our apologies), and Cameron Cox.

Back-up graphic support was provided by Aaron Floyd, Devin Floyd and Doris Halsey.

We wish to thank SiteSection survey groups from the Oak Hill Academy Boy Scout Troop, Grayson County High School’s ECO Club, the Southwest Virginia Home Educators and especially Devin Floyd as creator and director of SiteSection.

We also wish to thank the Harris and Frances Block Foundation and MUSE (Musicians United to Sustain the Environment) for their generous support.

Scott Jackson-Ricketts

Director, BRDC