Outstanding artwork for Trust greeting cards

All winners of our Greeting Card Design Competion provided outstanding artwork and it was good to see two local school children feature prominently, says Craig Presland, CEO of The Forest Bridge Trust.

“It is great to see our beautiful flora and fauna so well drawn along with Roger’s five native bird drawings. These will all feature on the Trust’s greeting cards,” he says.

The competition winners were all pleased to contribute their designs to fundraising for the Trust.

The winners were; Overall winner – Roger Wiliams (Warkworth), Intermediate winner, Siara Karuna (Pakiri), Junior winner, and Beau McKay-Sutherland (Matakana).

Roger’s prize was a trail camera supplied by AJ Productions and a stunning silver Kiwi pendant supplied by Chris Worth. (Roger submitted five drawings – two Kiwi, a NZ Dotterel, a Takahe and a White-faced Heron).

Siara won a TBFT jacket and t-shirt plus art supplies for her graphite and coloured pencil drawing, “New Growth”. Beau won a book and art supplies for his drawing, “The Forest of Palms”.

TBFT’s greeting card initiative was also the supported by local artist, Ruby Watson who donated a design for a greeting card.

Back Row: Craig Presland, Roger Wiliam, Anne Ginders
Front Row: Beau McKay-Sutherland, Siara Karuna, Michelle Worth

Greeting Cards will be produced from all these designs with the production sponsored in part by the Fiddly Farty Company in Point Wells.Greeting card design competition winner, Roger Williams is a retired structural engineer who started doing more art during the covid lockdowns in recent years.

Roger from Warkworth is a volunteer at Tawharanui Open Sanctuary and with Forest and Bird, and a passive supporter of the work of The Forest Bridge Trust.

The inspiration for his winning Brown kiwi, NZ Dotterel, Takahe and White-faced heron card designs was the wildlife at Tawharanui where he often helps with bird monitoring.

He will use the trail camera for monitoring projects at Tawharanui, including checking how pests such as feral cats, rats and stoats, search for and respond to holes in the pest proof fence.

He says, winning the competition was “the biggest thrill for years” and he’s now keen to develop his art to a new level.

Ruby Watson who donated her design, works part-time as an artist in Warkworth, taking commissions and working on projects with clients. Her card design was inspired by the specific native plants that are in our rohe and particularly important to the work of The Forest Bridge Trust.

“I love the kaupapa of TFBT and feel lucky to be able to support such an awesome organisation through art”, says Ruby. “The team at TBFT worked with a botanist to specify the plants in their area and I just drew them.”

Allan Foot from AJ Productions in Hamilton, donated the Browning trail camera prize to the winner for use in pest control monitoring.

As a former trapper, Allan says he knows all about the damage pests can do and that was an incentive to support the work of groups like The Forest Bridge Trust.

“We try to help and support wildlife groups protec.ng our na.ve flora and fauna,” he says.

AJ Productions has been operating since 2008, supplying trail cameras to wildlife organisations (including DOC and other government agencies) throughout Aotearoa.

“We were one of the first to do this in New Zealand and now supply about 1000 cameras per year around the country.”

He says the benefit of having the trail cameras for pest control work is their ability to capture passing pests such as stoats when it might seem an area is free of every last pest.

Place your order for a pack of cards now – $12.00 for a mixed pack of 4 cards, $20.00 for a pack of 8 (one of each design). Please email anne@theforestbridgetrust.org.nz to request your cards and arrange payment and postage