Butterfly Festival set for September 15
The
14th annual Haynesville Celebration of Butterflies will be held September 15 at
the Claiborne Parish Fairgrounds in Haynesville.
The
festival features a parade, seminars, a butterfly conservatory stocked with
plants and butterflies in all four stages of metamorphosis, many children’s'
activities, vendors, musical and dance entertainment, and several contests for
which prizes are awarded.
The
butterfly-themed parade, which begins at 9a.m., includes a pet parade with
trophies awarded for the largest, smallest, most unusual, and best-decorated
pets. To enter, contact Linda Knox at (318) 624-1606 or e-mail
.
Programs
for the day will be two presented by Felder Rushing, titles undetermined,
Butterflies From Scratch, The Monarch Butterfly, Live Demonstration with
Caterpillars and Their Host Plants and a skit God Planted Those Dandelions.
Vendors
desiring a space at the festival should contact Pat Bourn, (318) 624-1216, 3647
Hwy 2 Alt, Haynesville, LA 71038, or LeBois Sincox, (318) 624-0661, 2087
Dogwood Drive, Haynesville, or Sissy Balda, (318) 624-2483, 500 Main Street,
Haynesville.
To
enter the nature photography contest and exhibit, contact Mary Anna Perryman,
(318) 377-1006, 299 Perryman Drive, Dubberly, LA 71024, e-mail
.
The
container gardening contest offers monetary prizes. An entry must be from your
own garden and can feature any type of flowering or foliage plants growing in a
container. To enter, contact Beverlee Killgore, day (318) 624-1122, evening
(318) 624-2432, 2222 Main Street, Haynesville, LA 71038, e-mail
.
There
will be a horseshoe pitching contest with $100 awarded to the winning team.
For information concerning this and other festival activities or a brochure
contact Loice Kendrick-Lacy, (870) 234-4910 or (318) 624-1929, 203 Troy,
Magnolia, AR 71753, , www.claiborneone.org.
Butterfly Queen to promote new book
‘Gardening to Attract Butterflies,
The Beauty and the Beast’
Loice
Kendrick-Lacy is the founder and director of the Haynesville Celebration of
Butterflies, with its 14th annual being held this year at the
Claiborne Parish Fairgrounds in Haynesville, Louisiana. She is a member of the
Louisiana Native Plant Society, Louisiana Ornithological Society, the Cajun
Prairie Habitat Preservation Society, the Haynesville Garden Club, the Arkansas
Audubon Society, and is a master gardener certified in both Louisiana and
Arkansas.
Known
as the Butterfly Queen, Loice, a long-time resident of Haynesville, will be
having an advance previewing for her first book, Gardening to Attract
Butterflies; The Beauty and the Beast. Television interviews will be given and
advance orders will be taken that day, but Loice's first book signing will be
at the annual Butterfly Festival in Haynesville, Louisiana on Sept. 15, 2012.
Having
been a journalism major at what was then Southwest Texas State Teachers
College, Loice has published poetry and many articles on nature. For the past
37 years, she has written a column for the newsletter of the Arkansas Audubon
Society, also serving as that publication's editor for 10 of those years.
An avid
birder as well as butterflier and lover of all things in nature, Loice taught
either botany or ornithology for 14 years at the Arkansas Audubon Ecology Camp.
For over 30 years, she has been giving programs on butterflies, birds,
wildflowers and gardening. Since 2004, she has taught butterfly gardening to
each new class of master gardeners in Southwest Arkansas. Prior to moving to
Arkansas, she taught the same subject to master gardeners in Northwest
Louisiana.
In
reference to the Haynesville Celebration of Butterflies, botanist and
butterflier Dr. Charles Allen says, "This event has seen a lot of visitors
over the years but none as important as the butterflies themselves. I am a
fortunate person who has been able to attend the festival each year since its
inception in 1999. As the director, Loice puts much work into the festival,
making sure that every little detail is in place on that Saturday in September
each year when butterflies are given their due celebration in Northwest
Louisiana. This is the reason the festival has continued with such success for
13 years. Her book on gardening to attract butterflies is an appropriate crown
for Loice, the Butterfly Queen."
Loice
was born in Runnels County in the country near the small town of Talpa, Texas,
in a setting idyllic for her to become Nature's Child. Since there were no
school buses in the area when the time came, her three older siblings were
homeschooled using textbooks supplied by the public school. Later when she was
nearing school age, Loice says her mother tried with little success to interest
her in books. Concerning her reluctance to open a book, Loice explains,
"My interest at that time was in exploring the attractions of nature, thus
I wanted to spend every daylight hour outside."
By the
time Loice had reached school-age, the family had moved closer to a school
where she was placed in the first grade, but the following year she was
advanced to the third, skipping the second. She says, "I give the credit
for any success I had in school to my mother for being such a gifted teacher
even though she was often stymied in her efforts to interest me in scholarly
pursuits in those early years."
In the
first few years after Loice and her older siblings entered public school, the
four rode Shetland ponies to school. As they had only three ponies, Loice rode
behind her brother on what was the smallest of the ponies. She says her parents
wouldn't entrust her to any but their only son nor did they think any but he
could handle Bay Molly, a cantankerous and stubborn little animal.
Loice
recalls some of her remembrances from her early childhood: a turtle laying its
many eggs in a sandy spot in the yard; searching for the nests of wrens under
the syrup buckets capped over fence posts; climbing the mulberry tree by the
chicken house to feast on its juicy black fruit, unmindful of the resulting
stains on her clothing; watching horned toads dining on their favorite insects
in the red ant beds and wondering if they ever got stung as she often did;
riding her stick horse (the dried stalk of a yucca plant) to search out new
adventures; using a broom straw to bring forth a doodle bug from its inverted
conical pit in the sand, all the time reciting "doodle bug, doodle bug
your house is on fire;" looking for the sky-blue eggs of bluebirds in
cavities of rotting fence posts; making necklaces from smilax leaves joined
together with thorns from mesquites; picking the delicious agarita berries to
enjoy with cream (real cream straight from the family dairy cows) and sugar;
frolicking barefoot on the front lawn in a gentle rain.
Recalling
the above pleasures of her childhood, Loice admits that truly not much has
changed; she can still enjoy all those simple things of nature. Perhaps with
one exception: the stick horse might better be used as a walking staff rather
than a trusty steed.
A nature photography contest will be part of the Haynesville Celebration of Butterflies to be held Sept 15 at the Claiborne Parish Fairgrounds in Haynesville. Entry classes are: Student in grades 1-4, grades 5-8, grades 9-12, and adults. All photographs will be on exhibition during the festival with winners being announced from the stage at 12:30 PM Awards each class are first place $20, second $15, third $10, and fourth honorable mention. For an entry form or further information, contact Mary Anna Perryman, 299 Perryman Drive, Dubberly, LA 71024, Ph (318) 377-1006 or email .
Festival Highlights
