When I was in the fourth grade in Green Bay, Wisconsin, my family took a trip to visit my grandparents in Florida. Prior to this I’d never been out of the state, much less seen an ocean! Sarasota Jungle Gardens was one of many tourist attractions we visited, and the one that most fascinated me. The exotic birds and variety of plants and animals created an immersion experience into a whole new tropical world. Back at school, I was required to do an extra project to compensate for the days I’d missed. My response was to build a shoebox diorama of the Jungle Gardens, complete with a mirror pond, Spanish moss, and the naturally outrageous flamingos.Fast forward fifty-plus years, and I now spend winters in Sarasota where the Jungle Gardens still exist. I am able to share the unchanged attraction - now kitschy with its 1950s-era lo-tech presentations - with my visiting grandsons. Coming from Wyoming, the boys are just as delighted by the face-to-face encounters with the big birds as I was as a child, and continue to be to this day.
The title Jailbirds refers to the numbered bands on the flamingos' legs, and also the way their spindly legs seem to form bars around the white ibis foraging on the ground.