NORTH VERNON — While June 22 to 28 was National Pollinator Week for the rest of the country, it was just work as us usual at the Jennings County Soil and Water Conservation District.
Since 2015, JCSWCD has exceeded U.S. Department of Agriculture and National Soil and Water Conservation Department criteria for efforts to preserve the nation’s pollinator population.
Because pollinators such as bees, butterflies and some birds are necessary in the process of growing two-thirds of humankind’s food, alarms went off across the nation when experts tracked a drastic reduction in the pollinator population.
When JCSWCD Director Andy Ertel and his assistant Kelly Kent learned of the national crisis, they decided to organize efforts to address the problem.
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The Pollinator Project Committee was subsequently formed to help rebuild the pollinator population in Jennings County.
“The way the community and the project committee came together to work on the pollinator problem was phenomenal,” Ertel said.
Ertel cited the many gardens planted throughout the county, and educational activities created by the organization, as some of the accomplishments of the Pollinator Project.
In recognition of its efforts, the JCSWCD and the Pollinator Project Committee have received numerous local, state and national awards.
“The Pollinator Project is not over. It is still in place and working,” Ertel said. “We are continuing to move forward in a steady pace now. There are pollinator gardens growing at private homes, businesses and other sites. We have a couple industries just now coming on board with gardens.”
The organization was recently involved in a pair of major projects: Tripton Park in North Vernon and the complete redesign of the Conservation Building at the Jennings County Fairgrounds.
The process of turning 50 acres of an old, deserted golf course into a modern family park in the center of North Vernon was finished by the city in the fall of 2019.
Upon its completion, pollinator gardens were planted throughout the rolling hills of the new Tripton Park.
“The pollinator gardens have all been planted and they are flourishing. You can already see a visibly healthy population of bees,” Ertel said. “By next month you will see them explode in flowers and beautiful colors. I think people will be stunned with the beauty throughout the park.”
One of the earliest accomplishments of the Pollinator Project was the planting of a large pollinator garden outside of the Conservation Building at the Jennings County Fairgrounds.
“The garden was in great shape but the building next to it was in terrible condition,” Ertel said. “The floor was in such bad shape, when it rained, the water came right up through the cracks.”
Volunteers in the Pollinator Project were drafted to form a new committee to repair the Conservation Building.
Committee members began to knock on doors to raise money for the necessary building repairs and several community organizations donated enough money to renovate the building.
The Jennings County Common Council, Jennings County Community Foundation, the Walmart Company and JCSWCD united to donate the $13,000 necessary for a new concrete floor throughout the 40 x 60 foot sized building.
Additional improvements were also made throughout the building and work began to create new creative and educational displays about the world of nature.
The Coffee Creek Conservation Club donated monies to provide a large display about bees for the center of the room, and one corner of the large room is dedicated to the types of wood produced by trees that grow in Indiana.
There will also be displays of soil and plant species and living wildlife .
A major part of the building’ s floor space is taken by a gallery of photographs of Indiana’s wildlife.
“Most of photographs were done by local photographers. We have used some Shutterstock, but most are local work,” Ertel said.
Kent and Bob Steiner processed over 200 photographs for eventual display in the gallery.
“We have enough photos to be able to rotate a display so a person visiting the gallery twice in three years will not see the same display twice,” Ertel said.
The Conservation Building was completed in time for this year’s county fair, but the fair was cancelled because of COVID-19.
Most people will not see the new and improved Conservation Building until next year’s fair, but the JCSWCD staff is trying to work out a system to also make the building available to educational and civic groups.
