Special to The Sun: Evesham Green Team member Janet Rolnick holds a picture of her nature superhero White Oak, along with a book on oak trees. Rolnick is standing in front of an oak in her backyard that she estimates is about 300 years old.
The Evesham Green Team is looking for some superheroes.
The team is asking residents to help raise public awareness about the benefits of nature’s ecosystem, plants, and insects by creating heroes and heroines whose powers evolve from the environment.
Team member Janet Rolnick said the effort was inspired by an episode of the TV reality series “Treehouse Masters,” in which a group created its own masks based on living things in the natural world. Rolnick presented the idea to green team peers at one of their meetings, then decided to create her own hero as an example.
Rolnick collaborated with one of her former art students to produce what she called the native White Oak superhero. She chose the oak because it is considered to be one of the most protective plants for insects and animals.
“Oak trees host more than 500 different forms of caterpillars,” Rolnick explained. “Every other baby bird gets a huge amount of caterpillars on a daily basis; If you look at statistics, our bird and insect population are dropping significantly and we need to help support them.
“I hope that, in some ways, we can help kids to research and come up with their own rendition.”
Ila Vassallo, also a green team member, noted that submissions will not be judged and that the green team’s intent with the natural superhero drawings is solely to raise environmental awareness.
“It’s not a contest,” Vassallo said. “We just want people to get involved in connecting with our natural world. We just want to get the word out and make people aware.”
The green team has other ways for residents to emphasize the environment: Print out and color Rolnick’s White Oak superhero, describe why White Oak is important to the environment and create a story with White Oak as the main character.
Participants can email their creations to EveshamGreenTeam@gmail.com then, with permission, the team will share them on its social media accounts and at at the Marlton Garden Tour on June 4.
