Rare Orchid, On the Banks daily painting by Everglades artist JoAnn Sanborn

On the Banks
7" x 5" (17.8cm x 12.7cm)
acrylic on Panel

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How exciting to learn, first on Twitter and then as a headline in today's Naples Daily News, that an orchid which no one has seen for almost 50 years years is thriving in the Fahahatchee strand! Three plants of the elusive orchid, were last seen in 1961 by a biologist who took the plants home to document them and save them from an area soon to be developed. No one has seen orchid Cyclopogon elatus since.

It’s really only kind of orchid nerds who are going to appreciate this, but it’s kind of cool,” Miami environmental scientist Chris Little, who made the find said Tuesday. He's wrong, because some of us who don't know the first thing about wild orchids are also celebrating the find.

Good biological news gives those of us who are sure we're on a doomed planet over run by a destructive dominant species hope that the earth is finding ways of renewing itself. Plus, it's delightful to know that the earth still has surprises for us.

You can find out more about Florida orchids at discoverer Chris Little's website and learn more about the Fakahatchee here.

Slaughter of birds, Joy to Spring daily painting by Everglades artist JoAnn Sanborn

Joy of Spring
5" x 7" (12.7cm x 17.8cm)
acrylic on Panel

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My day usually starts with a shower, turn on the coffee and the computer, and while each is getting warming up walk outside, pick up the newspaper, am greeted by a beautiful morning sky and often take a short walk before getting to work in the studio. It's quiet then, and yesterday you could feel spring in the air. The birds were singing, and you could almost see the buds swelling under warmth coming up from the south. Here, where some people can't see a change in the seasons, spring has come.

Even though it was a little colder this morning, today's morning chill didn't come from the weather. It came from the headlines in both of the papers I picked up. The Naples Daily News's it was a slaughter, and the Marco Eagle's 21 birds killed for fun both saddened and disgusted me. Apparently seven people with nothing more important to do went out and killed the birds for the fun of it. Fun??

340 species of birds have been documented in the Everglades. The birds of the Everglades were slaughtered almost to extinction in the 1920's for the purpose of obtaining their feathers for ladies hats. They're making a comeback, but its not quick, and there are still nowhere near the hundreds of thousands that used to blacken the skies.

People with no respect for our natural world have driven our land and our oceans to the brink of destruction. I hope they're prosecuted in Federal court to the fullest extent of the law!

Soft Evening Light daily painting by Jo-Ann Sanborn

Tomorrow night, Tuesday, will be the last of the Marco Island Center for the Arts summer Wine Tastings. I'm excited about being the featured artist and will have an exhibition in the small gallery. All the paintings I'll be showing are new this summer and will be different from those shown at the Orion Bank Artist Appreciation event last month. If you're on the island, come out and share a glass of wine with me, see my newest work, and support the Art League at the same time. Non-members will be charged $5 and members are free. Great deal.
Artists love and need publicity about their work, and there's a nice article about my art in the Naples Daily News Sunday's Etc. magazine. It's unusual to get a whole page, and pictures, too! You can read it here. Thanks, Quentin!
As you know, I'm not a technocrati, but if you get this blog in your mailbox, check it out here. After only about two days of working on it I've managed to get a small slide show up. Whoopie!

Soft Evening Light
7" x 5"
acrylic on board
$150 with FREE shipping and handling in the US