Have you ever heard of covering or wanted to cover a friend’s yard with plastic flamingos? Or even been driving around town recently and seen 10- 20 flamingos covering a neighbor’s grass? Well, this custom, which is called “flocking,” has become a huge fundraising tool.
Basically how it works is that youpay a small fee of 10-25 dollars, choose someone’s yard (preferably someone you know) and then a group of people will go out under the cover of darkness and “flock” your friend’s yard. And it’s all in the spirit of raising money for a good cause. The people doing the “flocking” in Farmville recently have been a group raising money for medication to help children in Honduras.
The town of Farmville has seen this “flocking” going on since the beginning of April; a group of volunteers from the Farmville United Methodist Church is raising money to go on a mission trip to Honduras in August.
Patti Wagner, a nurse in the Longwood University Student Health Center and who is on one of the two teams that aredoing the “flocking,” as well as going for the past years to Honduras, said that, “the flamingos stay on the lawns for 24 hours,” then the team collects them and moves on to the next “victim.”
If you are really afraid someonemight invade your lawn with plastic flamingos, you can even purchase a sort of “anti-flocking” insurance that guarantees your lawn will not be disturbed. All of the money raised is going to help pay for the medication that the teams will take to the seven villages they will travel to in August.
The groups will be in Honduras for one week and will go to help a different village every day. Wagner and the teams had a goal to raise $500-$600 through the Flocking Flamingos Fundraiser. Wagner was thrilled when she said they have already raised about $700.
There are two Longwood employees, Patti Wagner and Professor Hadley Sporbert from the nursing department, and two Longwood alum, Kelly Wagnerand Sarah Hardymon, on one of the teams.
When it is Wagner’s turn to “flock” a yard, she said, “I have it down to a science. [It] takes about two minutes because I know where to hold them to get them in the ground just right.” If you did not get a chance to get in on the current fundraiser, those who are going to Honduras have also scheduled a fundraiser in May at Sweet Frog to help raise more money for the trip.
For more information on the trip and donating opportunities contact Patti Wagner or Hadley Sporbert.
