The art in The Heron Dance CreativityJournal is inspired by a love of wild nature. Since its inception in 1994, Heron Dance has worked to help other nonprofits and wilderness protection groups by donating art and notecards for their fundraising. Heron Dance has donated almost $100,000 in art and notecards.

In addition to these art donations, we support the Northeast Wilderness Trust/Split Rock Wildway with financial contributions when we can.

To donate or to find out other ways to support Heron Dance visit here.

Recent Donations:

8th Acoustic Ecology Institute Aging Yoga Studio Alaska Watercolor Society Aldo Leopold Community School Allies, Inc. Aloha Foundation Alzheimer’s Support Network American Canoe Association American Hiking Society American Indian/Alaska Native Employees American River Conservancy American Tissues Services Foundation Annals of Earth Appalachian Voices Arizona Native Plant Society Arkansas Environmental Education Association The Association for Community Living Association for Experiential Education Audubon North Carolina Audobuon Society of NH Audubon Society of RI Aurora School Avian Haven Awen Grove Back Bay Restoration Foundation Back Bay Wildlife Refuge Bal Swan Children’s Center Bethlehem Land Trust Bethlehem Public Library Big Chico Creek Ecological Reserve Biodiversity Conservation Alliance Bioneers Birdsong Nature Center Black Canyon Audubon Society The Boston Home Boulder Shelter for the Homeless Bridge Crossing Poetry Center Bristol Friends of the Arts Broadened Horizons Camping & Education Foundation Cancer Care Connection Canton Potsdam Hospital Foundation The Carpenter’s Boat Shop Catholic Human Services Cedar Hill Retreat The Center for Ecology and Spirituality Center for Education, Imagination and the Natural World The Center for Wildlife Center for Biological Diversity The Central Pennsylvania Symphony Central Vermont Community Land Trust Clinton Eaton Ingham Community Mental Health Coal River Mountain Watch Colchester Land Trust Columbia Land Trust Community Partners for Affordable Housing Connecticut Forest and Park Association Conservation Northwest CORE/El Centro Council for the Arts, Chambersburg, PA The Cove Center for Grieving Children Damariscotta River Association The Dragonfly Project Earth First! Earth Literacy Earthaven Learning Center: Programs for Personal and Planetary Healing Earthcare Northwest Seattle Audubon Eco-Justice Center Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians & Western Art The Eyak Preservation Council Family Services of Connecticut Farm and Wilderness Foundation Findhorn Foundation| Finger Lake Land Trust First Presbyterian Church–Children’s Place Forest Watch Fox Run Pastoral Ministries Franciscan Montessori Earth School Franklin County Home Health Agency Friends & Neighbors of Nahant Marsh Friends Community School Friends in Support of the Hatchery Friends of Fort Ticonderoga Friends of Metea Friends of Saskatoon Island Provincial Park Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness, MN Friends Wilderness Center Fuquay-Varina High School Gates Rogers Foundation Inc Golden Eagle Audubon Society Goose Creek Wildlife Sanctuary Great Smoky Mountain Heritage Center Greater Yellowstone Coalition Guide Dogs for the Blind Gulf Coast Teaching Family Services Gwendolyn Brooks Cultural Center Habitat Education Center, Madison, WI Hands Foundation Hanover County, VA Head Start HCAR Bay Center Heartland Golden Retriever Rescue Group Heartwood Hemophilia Foundation of Minnesota Hesston Menonite Church Hilltown Cooperatiove Charter Public School Hoofbeats Therapeutic Riding Center Hospice by the Bay Hospice Care, Inc – Janesville, WI Hospice Services of Addison County Hospice of Hancock County, ME Hospice Satilla Hospice Volunteer Services Huff Run Vista Illinois Audubon Society Indianapolis Gestalt Institute Interfaith Housing Center International Association of Sufism Island Crisis Care Society ISU Trumpeter Swan Restoration Committee Jack L. Boyd Outdoor School, CA Jewish Family & Children’s Service Journey of Hearts Jubilee Farm Keith Hammer Kenmare Alternative High School Kentucky River Foothills King Street Youth Center Kitten Rescue of Mason County Kitty Angels Land Conservancy of Adams County The Lehman Center – Children’s Aid Society Living Earth Living Wisdom School Lower Columbia Basin Audubon Lummox Press Madison Audubon Society Matthew Walker Comprehensive Health Center Maine Canoe Symposium Mainely Girls March of Dimes Marin County Audubon Society Matthew Walker Comprehensive Health Center Medina County Fund Medicine Horse Center Mercy Medical Center Gift Shop Michigan Hepatitis C Foundation Michigan Nature Association Minnesota Waters Monte Vista Unitarian Universalist Congregation Mountain Park Environmental Association Mountain Park Environmental Center Multnomah Outdoor School Program Muraviovka Park of Sustainable Land Use in the Amur Region of Far Eastern Russia Natural Land Institute New England Arts for Animals New Jersey Conservation Foundation New Jerusalem Now Nisqually Land Trust North Valley Health Center Northern Rockies Bioneers Conference Northeast Wilderness Trust Northwest Ecosystem Alliance The Northwest Ballet Company in Kalispell, MT The Northwoods Stewardship Center Ocean Arks International Pacific Harbors Council Parabola Penobscot Indian Nation Petpals Animal Assisted Therapy Pine Woods Audubon Society Potomac Riverkeeper Prairie Woods Environmental Learning Center Radical Grace, published by the Center for Action and Contemplation Raincoast Conservation Society The Raptor Trust The Recoverywing > Redefining Progress RESTORE: The North Woods River Runners for Wilderness Riverside-Salem UCC Roaring Run Watershed Association Sacred Earth Network St. Louis Effort for Aids Salem Audubon Society The Salvation Army The Samaritan Project San Luis Obispo Child Development Center Santa Sabina Center San Luis Obispo Child Development Center The Salvation Army School of Lost Borders School of Natural Wonder Sea & Sage Audubon Society Senior Advocacy Services – Santa Rosa, CA Servite Center for Life Shadowcliff Shakti Rising Shasta Mountain Learning Center Shadow Lake Preservation Project Shelburne Community School Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth Snow Lion School South Branch Watershed Association Southeast Alaska Land Trust Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance Spannocchia Foundation Spirit in Nature Spirit Trail The Stillpoint Foundation St Louis Effort for AIDS Stone County Arts Council The Sun The Swanview Coalition Talking Leaves TallGrass Writers Guild Taos Youth Music School Texas Rivers Protection Association Thorne Eco. Inst. of Waterton Canyon Tidewater Appalachian Trail Club Tin Mountain Conservation Center Towson Unitarian Universalist Church Two Roads Maine United Christian Church, Lincolnville Center, ME Unity in the Dunes University of Wisconsin-Madison, UU Congregation of Erie Velie Memorial Fund, Inc. Ventura County AIDS Partnership Vermont Beekeeper Association Vermont Businesses for Social Responsibility Vermont Fish & Wildlife Department Vermont Natural Resources Council The Vermont River Conservancy The Virginia Thurston Healing Garden Visiting Nurses Association and Hospice Waldorf Education Columbus Washington Wilderness Coalition Watershed, an art and literary journal — Brown University The Welcome Door Foundation West Seattle Unitarian Universalists Wild Canid Center Wild Earth The Wild Foundation Wilderness Awareness School Wildlands Project Wildlife Rescue and Rehabilitation, Inc The Wildlife Society Winter Wildlands Alliance Wisconsin Partners for Sustainability Wisconsin Women’s Education Network on Addiction & Recovery Wolf Education and Research Center The Women’s Center Wooden Canoe Heritage Association World Agricultural Forum World Fellowship Center World Wilderness Congress Zen Community of Columbia

And Some Letters We Have Received …

I just wanted to thank you personally for the 100 greeting cards that you donated to the Earthaven Learning Center. They are beautiful! I was so excited to be able to use them to thank donors. What a blessing you are! –Tracy Kunkjle, Earthaven Learning Center

Dear Heron Dance…

Thank you so much! The print has arrived, and it is so beautiful and very calming to gaze at. I appreciate your generosity for the print as well as the publications. We will be sure to publicly thank Rod and promote Heron Dance

Annette Pearl

The Heron Dance newsletters are such a welcome sight when my email opens. They are a cause for pause and reflection bringing peace and a bit of balance to my day. Several friends are now familiar with your art, your site and newsletters, too. I keep spreading the word as best I can about something that is special to me. As our annual fundraiser grows in popularity and attendance, I would like to use that venue again to also help spread the word about Heron Dance and your work.
Last year, you graciously donated a signed limited-edition watercolor print of Swan Reflection to Medina County Community Fund. It caused a flurry of bidding and comments that would be nice to repeat or develop, if you are able to donate again. May we add a print to that listing for this year’s silent auction?
The mission of our permanent endowment fund is to improve the quality of life for residents in our county. If you would like an annual report showing our activities, I would be happy to provide one. This quarter is the first time in ten years that the fund has stepped over the $1,000,000 mark. It is cause for celebration for us. As we grow we can make more and more of a difference in the community at large. We would love to make you part of that growth.

A devoted fan,
Barbara Cumming
Medina County Community Fund

You are very generous! I am thrilled to be able to offer such beautiful art at our “Heart of Winter” event. Thank you VERY much! We will add your site to our website after the Auction and acknowledge you. I am a heron-o-phile from way back and so happy to find you on your website. I also am the co-founder and Executive Director of the Virginia Thurston Healing Garden, a small non-profit in Harvard MA that offers a community of support for those experiencing breast cancer, with no financial barriers. Blue herons have played a large part in my own experience of breast cancer (twice) and they are indeed my spirit guides. The Healing Garden has a fund-raising auction on February 6th and we would be so honored to have a print and/or notecards to offer our guests. Many thanks.

Sincerely,
Betsy Tyson-Smith, M.A.
Virginia Thurston Healing Garden |link!|

I just wanted to thank-you personally for the 100 greeting cards that you donated to the Earthhaven Learning Center. They are beautiful! I was so excited to be able to use them to thank donors. What a blessing you are!

Tracy Kunkjler
Earthaven Learning Center:|link!|
Programs for Personal
and Planetary Healing

I have been writing to various men who are now, and some who have been for a long time prison inmates. Most of those I write to are prisoners of conscience. There are about ten of them on my list. Seems like somewhere I read that prison subscriptions are free, for Heron Dance. Is this true?

Thanks,
K.M. Orion

Yes, that is true. We will give free subscriptions to any prisoners who write to us asking for a subscription.

Thanks, Heron Dance,

I received the print last week and it is beautiful. I never would have been able to choose. All of us at Aldo Leopold School thank you for your generosity and the beautiful thoughts you share.

Peace and Joy,
Kristine Schwartz

My Name is Nancy Schaufele and I have been a subscriber for years. I read in today’s email that you send donations to non profit groups. I am the director of a small nonprofit organization called Medicine Horse. We use horses and wilderness to help adults and children who have suffered from trauma and/or abuse. We are connected to local agencies such as Hospice, Child advocacy, the battered women’s shelter, the school systems and the Navajo and Ute tribes. We are located in the Four Corners area near Mesa Verde National Park. Essentially, we live in the middle of nowhere. This poses a problem with resources. Large cities have resources to sustain programs such as this. We essentially exist on our fundraisers and grants. This said, we are having our annual fundraiser and silent auction this Saturday, November 2nd. The community is very, very supportive and we normally raise a large percentage of our working funds from it (unlike a ropes course, horses continue to eat).

I would be most appreciative if we could use something from Heron Dance for this event. Of course, this is last minute and living in the middle of nowhere kind of slows down the mail. I would be happy to personally pay for any express postage in order to get it here in time.

Let me share a little story with you. One that happened last week:

A ten year old child was referred from hospice. Her father had committed suicide, the mother was in drug rehab and she was sent to live with grandparents. Her grandfather is dying of cancer and the grandmother is deep in grief. The therapist called me and asked if we could see if horse therapy would help this child. She was completely shut down and would not speak to anyone.

When she came I introduced her to Alex, our little rescue mustang. He had been tied to a fence post and beaten until nearly dead. We rescued him and have used him with children – he loves kids but distrusts adults.

I told this child about Alex before I took her out to the paddock to meet him. She marched up to Alex, threw her arms around him and told him her entire story, sobbing into his neck. The therapist and I stood in shock as we watched the two of them “talk”. I left them alone for quite awhile. Then I as stepped closer this beautiful little ponytailed blond told me to “stay still and be quiet – Alex has something to tell me.” Then she put her forehead on his forehead and they stood there head to head. This is amazing because Alex does not like his head to be touched (being tied and beaten will do that). Then she stepped back and told me that Alex had said that he had been very, very sad like her but he told her that he was better now and that she will get better too. But she has to trust us.

This is a true story and only one of many. I spent twenty-five years in the mental health field but in my later years turned to wilderness and animals to help others heal. I like to say that in working with this program I have never had so much fun for so little money in my life. Very, very few of the people we see can afford anything. We give our services away to anyone who comes. Life is too short not to do so.

So… this is most likely more information than you want to hear. However, I wanted to give you a picture of who we are. There is a web site that may help: www.medicinehorsecenter.org |link!|

I would appreciate your sharing this with Ann and Rod. I have used so much of Heron Dance in my work.

Blessing to you.
Nancy Schaufele, M.S.
Director Mental Health Services
Medicine Horse Center

We featured this letter from Nancy in our weekly email, A Pause For Beauty.
We received this letter from her a few weeks later:

Please let Rod know that we have received nearly $1,500 from Heron Dance Nature Art Journal subscribers as well as an offer of art. One artist in Montana wants to do some art of Alex, the little buckskin mustang I work with.

Actually, Alex did something quite spectacular on Friday. We had been seeing a teenager who, I felt, was in trouble but she had been denying any problems. Alex kept trying to pull the sleeve of her sweatshirt up. He even nipped at her arm which is very unusual for him. When I asked her what was going on she started crying and lifted her sleeve to show me where she had started cutting on herself again. Then she told Alex how sorry she was and that she would not hurt herself any longer. He let out a huge sigh and went back to grazing. I had a new therapist with me who has never been around horses. She said that if she had not seen it with her own eyes she would never have believed it.

Anyway… Just to say, thank you again. And Alex thanks you.

Blessing,
Nancy

Click here to go back up to the list of nonprofits we have supported.