At the Center, we will have a Learning Nursery to grow and care for endemic and native plants, tree saplings, bamboo, and medicinals, while also creating a place for student groups and those interested in learning hands-on growing techniques. The Nursery will also support those interested in starting microenterprises in CSAs, mushroom farming, mushroom composting, growing and selling unique edibles, etc.
Our nursery enables us to grow saplings to regenerate endemic and native plants in Belize, as well as bamboo for building, and many other beneficial trees to increase species diversity, and provide greater varieties of fruit, nuts, and homes for wildlife. To mitigate loss of threatened native species, the nursery will grow an abundance of these species as part of our replanting efforts.
Maintaining a nursery allows us to easily record data and maintain reports on the number and types of trees we grow and distribute, and the different methods used along the way.
The nursery is a place for school groups to visit and gain hands-on opportunities for growing, planting, and caring for trees and other vegetation, as well as for weekend workshops for community members to learn a variety of new techniques. Our nursery will supply the trees and other plants for all of our onsite planting projects, our community outreach projects, and our tree planting projects like the annual Wild Earth Stewardship Festival where we attempt to plant hundreds of thousands of trees together with our community.
TREE REPLANTING PROJECTS
Project Green Hands earned a place in the Guinness Book of World Records in 2006 for planting more trees in less time than any other group in history. Together 250,000 people planted 856,000 trees in 3 days!
If more people had the courage and determination to attempt this kind of remarkable feat, we could reforest the world in no time at all.
Civilizations around the world are showing the capacity to fight desertification, and reforest their lands, particularly if given the authority to do so. For example, in the semi-arid tropical savannah of the African Sahel on the edge of the Sahara, peasant farmers re-greened their nation after the government granted the people authority over their natural resources. Suddenly the farmers were responsible for their own trees and began carefully tending them, fighting the dust of the Sahara together. By carefully tending and protecting trees they were able to reforest their land which made farming more productive, reduced the dust, saved time when gathering firewood, and retained more water—increasing resistance to drought.[1]
Trees make it possible for us to inhabit the earth and perform an incredible amount of functions. Trees affect whether or not we have sufficient aquifer recharge. When rain falls through the leaves, trees clean the water through metabolic processes. Trees on ridges catch rain clouds and initiate rainfall to water our crops. The more reforestation we do the more we can repair interrupted hydrological systems and encourage evapo-transpiration.
Species should be carefully replanted in conditions similar to their natural habitat, in areas where they are currently sparse or nonexistent. Replanting projects help expand tree cover in areas that have been deforested, and strengthen community interactions by bringing together people from local village communities and nearby urban cities for tree planting events. We will hold our tree planting events at local schools and farmer’s markets, in nearby city centers, and at the annual Wild Earth Summit.
Wild Earth Stewardship Center will network with local nurseries and community members to grow tree saplings and native plants from our nursery, and will coordinate collection of donations from other nurseries around the area for planting events. We will work with volunteer planters on planting techniques and long term care.
[1] Mertens, Richard, “Can’t see the forest for the trees,” University of Chicago Magazine, Sept-Oct 2008
