First visit to the greenbelt

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Today our elementary school students came out for their first visit to the greenbelt. As they arrived, we gave them a history of the greenbelt and an overview of what they would be doing. In giving the history of the site, we explained the bad condition that the greenbelt used to be in. The Himalayan blackberry was so overgrown that it had created a monoculture. We are currently working on improving biodiversity, and as the kids walked through to their work site they gained an appreciation for the restoration efforts thus far. It really looks amazing!
We lead them to a 4000 sq.ft. area where they began digging up Himalayan blackberry rootballs.

Then at noon, our good friend John Brown came to deliver 500 plants from DirtyPretty Nursery. Before we took lunch, the kids managed to put together a plant brigade (similar to a bucket brigade), spread themselves out over 100 ft., and moved those 500 plants
from the van to a nursery spot.

After lunch, the kids got some hands-on experience with planting.
They planted, tagged, and named 28 Hemlock, 8 Willow, 1 Deer fern, 56 Sword fern, and 9 trailing blackberry within the area they had just maintained.

We really got a lot done!

To learn more about what they’re doing, visit Nov. 7th’s blog entry.