Conservation Volunteers—July 30-August 3, 2012

This week a group of Conservation Volunteers braved cold, wet, windy weather and made a major contribution our tree planting efforts.

The team was led by Ashleigh Carden of CVNZ and included Jenny from Taiwan, Kathrin and Ann-Kattrin from Germany, Chiara and Luca from Italy, and Barbara from Austria. 

This group included a couple of firsts.   This was the first time Ashleigh led a team at CUE Haven.  Welcome!  And we look forward to working together in the future! And Chiara and Luca were our first volunteers from Italy.

The team arrived on Monday morning and after introductions and an orientation they went to work.  It was too wet to go outside and plant so we worked in the nursery, potting up small plants and seedlings.

This is a very important job.  In the nursery we grow trees from seeds harvested in the mature bush on the property.  The seeds are planted in trays and shortly after they germinate, they are planted in their own little pots.  They soon outgrow those pots and need to be planted into larger containers.  They are then kept in the nursery for a year or so before being planted. 

Tom gave the group an explanation of the process and a demo and they soon got to work:

And the end result is a great crop of healthy seedling for future plantings.

On Tuesday the weather improved and the team went to work planting.  We were joined by a group of horticulture students from VisionWest Community Trust.  The CVNZ team helped out by laying out the trees to be planted in the planting area and then the two groups worked together for the day.

For the rest of the week the team was on their own and did a lot of tree planting.

 The hard working team even took their breaks and lunches in the field.

They got to see a lot of the property as they moved around to various areas to fill in gaps in previously planted areas.

In spite of the weather the team managed to plant about 1,600 trees.  It was a great effort and we really appreciate all your hard work. Thank you! We hope you will come back and see how your trees have grown in the coming years.