Artworks for birds & shade grown coffee

I watch birds no matter where I am. Drawing is a way I record these birds. I am an artist/printmaker. I think of feeding birds as a way of paying the birds a model fee. When I get an idea or see am image with a warbler or flycatcher, how can I pay them a model fee? I have become an advocate for bird conservation.
I call my business Artworks by Lydia. Some people might find the name odd to people if they only go on my bird tour. The bird tour component of Artworks is a part of my bird conservation effort. My goal is to connect people to the birds and where they live. Habitat is key. If folks understand the connections then they are going to care.

However, not everyone wants to go out to look at birds. I have one etching I call Crowning Point. A Great Crested Flycatcher is peeking out at the top of the magnolia tree. This a very common summer bird here but most folks do not know the bird because it lives high in the trees and fly catches. This etching gives me a chance to talk about these birds.

My art guild is Georgia Coastal Artist. We have three art shows a year. We started planning for the December show back in the summer. I volunteered to bring the coffee. I was planning the birding festival and had just talked to Bo Mann at Wake Up Coffee Company. This is a local business selling shade grown/ fair trade coffees. Perfect! I could support a local company that was promoting the same things I support. The base is broadened to people who might not know they are supporting bird conservation.

Bo was great. He brewed up some tasty Costa Rican coffee and all the recyclable fixing. Then I set it up at the A.W. Jones Heritage Center the location of our art show. There was some one at the coffee table all day talking about the coffee.

Here is fellow artist, Joyce Shelander, sitting at our coffee table.

We passed out fliers that explained the importance of shade grown/fair trade. Every little bits helps. By the way, here is some of my new artworks which I showed at December 4th art show.