Trees; a crowd

To celebrate Earth Day, Five Rivers laid on a tree planting opportunity.

Some enormous new houses have recently been built adjacent to one of the preserve's boundaries, which many visitors complain spoil the view across a major expanse of grassland.  The Five Rivers director had managed to get hold of some spruces and conifers which ultimately should grow up and provide a good screen, as well as creating suitable roosts for owls and hawks.

More than 300 trees in fact. Blimey! Earlier in the week there was some concern that not enough people would turn out for the planting - no-one had signed up.  But come the day there was a huge crowd, armed with thick gloves and shovels.  All sorts of people: elderly ladies; families with young kids; and even Joe Martens (the Commissioner of NYS Department of Environmental Conservation, no less).

Fortunately, given how dry it has been lately, the maintenance crew had been through ahead of time and dug all the holes with a machine.  All we volunteers had to do was shake the trees out of their pots, plonk them in the holes and do a little back-filling.  With so many hands to the work, 300+ trees were planted in less than half an hour.

And now those trees are left to the mercies of Nature - who seems to be feeling pretty merciful, actually.  The dry spell broke later in the afternoon and now we're having some good soaking rain (at last), and even a little lightning - perfect conditions to help newly-planted trees settle in.