Oregon Tree Planting
February and March are the main tree planting months in western Oregon. And, we’re celebrating the season with a series of youth tree planting days at the Hopkins Demonstration Forest.
“We LOVE the Forest!,” declared Mike Bondi, a volunteer at the first Hopkins tree planting day on Saturday, February 14. Bondi, along with volunteer Cliff Puckett from Oregon City, led a tree seedling planting demonstration for youth from several homeschool networks in the area.
The youth tree planting programs were organized by Lindel Evers, new forestry educator at the Hopkins Demonstration Forest. Lindel provides outdoors, in-the-forest education experiences for homeschool youth in the region , as well as, provides Outdoor School programming using a day-school model.
According to Evers, “Our goal is to get every young person in the forest for science-based learning. The natural world around us is often one of the most powerful ways for students to learn. At Hopkins there are incredible lessons to learn about biology, animals and insects, chemistry and water quality, engineering and math—it’s really endless what we can teach with practical every-day examples in the world around us!”
Additional tree planting programs for homeschool youth are scheduled later in February. All sessions are fully booked. Several more sessions are planned in March. Contact Evers for more information or to register at lindel@FFIForests.org.
