Where Have All the Flowers Gone

Where Have All the Flowers Gone is based on the song of the same name by Pete Seeger.

This painting is part of an ongoing series of work promoting bat conservation. It acknowledges the connection between bats and agave plants. Bats are the primary pollinators of several species of agave plants, the basis for Tequila and Mezcal. Due to incredible growth in the Tequila market, producers now use cloned plants and harvest them before they flower. This farming practice has critically reduced the pollen available to several endangered bats.

In college, I took a train south from the United States through the state of Chihuahua, Mexico. Riding in the open air on a flat car in the evening, I saw miles and miles of agave fields. There were shallow, rolling red hills covered with massive silver blue-green cactus. I have never forgotten this.

More on Bat Conservation

The National Autonomous University of Mexico and the non-profit Tequila Interchange Project work together to educate producers and the public about the extinction of bats dependent on agave. They certify a standard called Bat Friendly to promote bat-friendly agriculture, which includes allowing a 5% of their agave population to flower before harvest.

Learn about bat conservation from Merlin Tuttle's Bat Conservation.
See work from my series on bat conservation on my portfolio website Between Starshine and Clay.