Kids and trees
Some HS kids are coming to plant trees as part of some sort of sustainability project. I don’t believe sustainability is enough. We strive to regenerate. That is what I will tell them when they come. Thanks to Rob Bracknell for the contact.
I supply the trees & tools
I will supply the trees, the tools, lunch and drinks. I will also give each of them a copy of “Sand County Almanac.” I think it is more work getting them to do it than it would be doing it myself, but I like the idea of getting kids doing something useful in the woods. Sometime in the future, I hope that this can be part of a catalyzing experience that enhances of even puts them on the path to conservation. Planting trees is good for the soul.
I don’t want the kids to suffer too much, so spent the day cutting paths through the brambles and briars.
They will be mostly planting the are area where the fire killed some trees or where the brambles killed the trees, or more likely discouraged the planters. That is another reason I needed to take down the brambles. My first photo shows a superficial but rather painful scrape I got when I pushed back one branch and got hit by another. I am hoping it doesn’t turn black and blue.
Planting paths Next is the path at Brodnax. There is a lot of space between trees. Now that I have an ATV, I bought a discer. I am going to plant pollinator wildflowers in the middle. Picture after that shows clover coming up on the fire line. I planted that last time. I am hoping we don’t a hard frost that might harm them. It has been a warm winter and it looks like an early spring, so maybe we will be okay.
Streams and sand
Picture #4 is my bench and stream on Diamond Grove. We had the bench in back of the house and Chrissy wanted to get rid of it, so I put it there. I can sit, listen to the water, drink beer and just enjoy being. The stream has moved a bit and I am getting a lot of sand. The sand has packed tight, as you can see in picture #5. It looks like a couple feet of sand has accumulated. I am not sure whence it came. Upstream I thought was mostly clay and the stream bed was always clay. Something got loose. When I get time, I will walk up the stream and see what I can see. The stream starts in a cow pasture a couple miles up and picks up water from my forest. As far as I know (knew) there are not points of significant erosion on my land, but I will check. All that sand came from somewhere. If it is somewhere of mine, I have to do something.