COOPER, Iowa, July 18, 2010 – A so-far anonymous artist has now installed two more fun piece of arts in trees along the Raccoon River Valley Trail in Greene County.  This brings to four the number of bicycles that have been found hanging in trailside trees, and all the bikes are decorated with long strings of colorful beads.

The first of these “bike sculptures” was discovered about three weeks ago, the second about two weeks ago, and the two most recent apparently were hung in the days just before the weekend of July 17-18.

There is no sign, explanation or signature on any of the four installations to give any indication who the artist is.   They are being carefully hung on limbs that are being trimmed to best showcase the bikes.  The beads are hung with some thought, because the longer you look at the bike, the more beads you seem to see.

The artwork is proving to be a hit with people using the RRVT.   The beaded-bicycles are the talk of Jefferson and Cooper.

You can get a look at the hanging beaded bicycles in the photos below here.

Here’s a photo of the bicycle hanging in a dead tree alongside the Raccoon River Valley Trail, just north of 310th Street in southern Greene County, about a mile south of the town of Cooper. Note the bicycle is accented with long strings of colorful beads.

This photo shows the perspective of how the bicycle art looks when you’re riding along on the trail.

This was the first of the beaded bicycles to appear hanging in another dead tree trailside, just north of 320th Street.

This neon green bike is hanging in a trailside tree just north of 290th Street in Greene County, on the east side of the RRVT. It is not as obvious to you when you are using the trail, since it is hanging in a live tree with plenty of foliage around it.

This little pink huffy is hanging in a beautiful evergreen tree on the west side of the RRVT, just north of the so-called “Graffiti Bridge.” This is in a very wooded area in the southeast corner of the town of Jefferson.