Giant Caterpillar Could House Proposed Butterfly Exhibit

AVON PARK - Think of a big, pink plastic caterpillar, antennas and all, sitting on Museum Avenue.
It would be about 7-foot wide and 20 feet long, full of exotic flowers and butterflies. You enter through the mouth, exit from... you get the idea... but it'll be "cute," city Project Manager Maria Sutherland said.

The names of sponsors will be etched on giant artificial leaves outside the caterpillar, which will be surrounded by a garden.

The caterpillar display could be an annual three-month exhibit and the centerpiece for a proposed garden. Both are still in the conceptual phases and their exact locations on Museum Avenue haven't been decided, but Sutherland pitched this idea Sunday afternoon.

The proposal began a few months ago after Sutherland went to Washington and saw the Smithsonian Institution's butterfly exhibit. People would wait in line and pay $16 to walk into the exhibit, she told the audience.

One of the visitors suggested she'd visit the butterfly garden at the Florida Museum of Natural History in Gainesville, which was built a few years ago. Cypress Gardens near Winter Haven also has an exhibit.

The proposed caterpillar project would be open around the time the Springtime on the Mall festival runs, starting in 2009. Other than the caterpillar, the outside garden on Museum Avenue will be permanent.

The caterpillar would be maintained by the Founders Garden Club, of which Sutherland is a member, and self-funded through an admittance fee that would cover its maintenance. About "99 percent" of the plants for the garden would be donated for it, she added.

Museum Avenue would also be narrowed down to two lanes in a separate, larger project. The Department of Transportation gave the approval for it late last week, Sutherland said.