NAME: COLLEEN CRAWFORD
AGE: 48
OCCUPATION: OWNER, FRAGRANT ACRES BUTTERFLY FARM
The idea of owning a butterfly farm seems like something straight out of a fairytale, but it isn’t all rainbows and chirping birds, says Colleen Crawford. There is a science behind raising those beautiful winged insects, and it takes time, dedication and a lot of love to perfect the art. Fortunately for the butterflies raised in Colleen’s Chickamauga, Ga.-based farm, those are three things she is all aflutter to provide.
I’ve had Fragrant Acres for 24 years, but I’ve been doing the butterflies for 18 years. I started by growing everlasting flowers and herbs-I would harvest them, dry them and turn them into flower arrangements and wreaths. I also turned some of the herbs into salves, lip balms and creams. While I was working with the flowers and herbs, I started to read about butterflies and how their life process worked. I’d read that people would be interested in releasing them at their weddings, and I thought that would have been lovely to have at my wedding. So, I began raising butterflies in Pennsylvania, where I lived at the time, and I shipped my first shipment from there. I was so nervous that it would do well and work, and it did. It’s just taken off since then.
I’ve always loved gardening. I grew up in the country in Pennsylvania and we always had a garden. My father was a gentleman farmer and a tree surgeon. At the time, we had 70 acres and he would have cows, horses and ponies. He would always garden and pay us kids-there were seven of us-a penny per plant that we put in the ground. When you’re little like that it’s nice to get a little bit of pay, but it’s one of your chores so you don’t appreciate it that much. But one day I asked if I could plant some flowers in this one corner of the yard, and he said yes. I started the flowers from seeds, and I just loved it. My love for nature started when I was just little and it stuck with me. There’s just nothing like being outside.
The two types of butterflies I have are Monarch and painted ladies. We do two types of releases: a mass release all at one time from a decorative box or one at a time from origami envelopes. I keep everything in a laboratory setting, so the temperature and the humidity is controlled. Everything has to be very sterile so bacteria doesn’t begin to cause problems. I compare it to a chicken farm. I have my butterflies and I make their environment as happy as can be for them. They lay their eggs which hatch as little caterpillars, and then I keep them fed and happy all the way until they turn into their chrysalis and hatch as butterflies. It takes about a month from when the eggs are laid to when they hatch as a butterfly. I sell some of them but I’m always replenishing the egg layers.
Everybody loves butterflies. When I first got started, I just loved butterflies and nature and the idea of it, but it was my customers who taught me the real deep meaning of a butterfly release. My first big customer would be for weddings, and they put so much hope in the two lives coming together and changing and just the hope that is pictured in the butterfly. Funerals became the next big interest. People find hope and comfort in being in one form as a human and then changing to another form in death, and butterflies represent that. I love to be there for people in their times of sadness when they’ve lost children or parents or spouses, or if it’s a joyous occasion. We’re part of these very, very important times in their lives and help make them special and memorable.
With nature, you can’t always control everything, although you do your best. I do not like to disappoint. I’m very careful. I’ve lost money over orders and traveled hundreds of miles on my own to get a package to someone if there was a problem with FedEx. During 9/11 when the terrorist attacks happened, everything was closed down and I hired people to travel across the country to deliver packages- one was in Michigan and one was in North Carolina- because weddings were at stake. It’s important that I meet my deadline. When people imagine what I do, they think it’s all butterflies, flowers and sweetness but it can be very stressful. They imagine that I’m in a room with butterflies flying around and birds singing. It can be wonderful like that, but the core work of it is not. It’s all timing and diligence and being careful with things.
Some important people have released my butterflies or been at one of my releases. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Condoleeza Rice were at one of my releases. When Steven Curtis Chapman’s daughter passed away, they purchased our butterflies and released them in memory of her. Disney has purchased butterflies from us. And Pearl Jam purchased them years ago for a video.
When I’m not working, I love spending time with my family and reading or singing. I also work in underage drinking prevention and prescription drug prevention. When the economy tanked, I had to keep a part-time job to keep my employees working at Fragrant Acres, and I became really involved with it and with trying to prevent those problems in our area. The grant for that program runs out in another year and a half so I’m juggling both jobs at the same time for now. In the end, I have this vision that somehow these two things will become connected.
I’m 48 years old now, and I’m planning how I’m going to go out. Not that 48 is that old, but I’m looking for the future of how I want to end my life. I don’t know how it will come about but I hope that my business with butterflies will connect somehow with drug and alcohol prevention. The two things just pair together so well. I would love to have a place where people can come and enjoy a hands-on experience with nature and butterflies, and receive healing in their lives. A place where families can come and make memories that wouldn’t cost a lot. I would love to go out that way, providing something like that for people.