Rainforest at the Fair

The North Dakota State Fair is about as far from any rainforest as you can get. But you can go t...  More »

The North Dakota State Fair is about as far from any rainforest as you can get. But you can go to a jungle right on the fairgrounds. Debbie Kuehn takes us there. If Barry DeVoll seems a bit wild... It probably has a little to do with the company he keeps... Barry's circle of friends includes a trio of wayward macaws and some pretty sssssizable snakes! It's not that Barry grew up swinging from vines or dodging poisonous frogs... he's actually a kid from the midwest. This roaming rainforest is really took root in his elementary years... Barry DeVoll/ Rainforest Experience-Well it all started in third grade with my elementary teacher Mrs. Maynard. She allowed us to build a tropical rainforest in the classroom. And with that, we learned about the different layers of the rainforest and the animals that live there. With that personal experience of foing through school that I knew I wanted to do something on the rainforest. And so people from all over the country... even the arid plains of North Dakota... are able to experience life in a rainforest... reptiles and all. Barry says it's more than 30-minutes of slight of hand and hand puppets... he hopes the audience goes away with a deeper understanding of a world most of us will never see... Barry- Not only for just the animals, for the species, and the uniqueness of the different animals that come from there, but also the trees you know they filter our air for breathing. If we keep at the rate at which we're going, every two seconds 60 acres of rainforest is being chopped down and actually there'll be no trees worldwide You may not be as excited about keeping company with creatures like this... But even if you come away with a simple snapshot and a memory... that may be enough to help keep Barry's wild dream of saving the rainforest alive.  « Less