Counting down. Five days to go now and we're getting things ready.
We've ordered all but three fruit trees, arranged to borrow some tools from the city's Parks and Rec department and have started to get some things in place for people who stop by to help or to celebrate Earth Day.
Volunteers will have trees to plant, a hillside to safely mulch (safe means that we're not tramping around in the steep canyon), and can plant some seeds or flowers in pots that they can make out of used newspapers to take home to their own yards. We'll teach them how.
There will be a table where you can learn a lot about trees too. At the 4-H Million Trees table, you can take a Scentuality test that I made about tree scents (take the test and see how good a snoot you've got!), have a chance to learn about what's going on with and enjoy the chance to learn a lot about trees and 4-H. Should be fun.
My brother is looking forward to brownies, mandarine oranges and lemonade. Because there can't be a tree planting without snacks, right?
I've even enlisted our county's science lead to offer visitors a chance to do an interactive science project where you can learn about trees, science and water.
Have a few more things to get, though. I'm hoping to get most of my supplies from Lowe's because they've been great about helping this community in general, and they have given me some discounts as I've done related projects over the last year.
One of the coolest things that I found is a special kind of gopher cage that is really easy to work with. I'm planting these trees with cages because I don't feel like having all this work raise money to buy trees, find people who need them, and then plant them go to nothing if gophers start chewing on the roots.
So each tree will come with a gopher basket, which will protect the tree's roots. They're coming to me from Sunol from a nursery called Old Town Nursery. I saw a video on YouTube in which the owner of the Old Town Nursery demonstrates their "planty hose" gopher baskets. Basically, they can be rolled up just like pantyhose, they stack flat, and they are just way easier for me to think about rather than add the task of making 40 gopher baskets out of chicken wire or hardcloth and getting them into a truck or van to get to San Bruno. My fingers and thumbs thank me every time I think about that choice.
Counting down till Sunday with planty hose and ornamental trees on the way! Citrus trees basking in the San Bruno sun. I have to order the rest of the fruit trees tomorrow morning.
It's all good!
To learn more about Julien's project, Reforesting San Bruno, visit http://www.4hmilliontrees.org/.
