Youth get their hands dirty

May 7, 2019

By Chris Drost

On the morning of May 3, six students from teacher Colleen Drew-Baehre's Grade 9 geography class at the North Hastings High School, joined Bancroft Area Stewardship Council board members, John O'Donnell, Vince Ewing, Ian Hendry and Roger Kelly, as well as resource member Cathie Best, to tag and assemble orders for approximately 7,000 tree and shrub seedlings. This is part of the annual BASC program aimed at encouraging people to plant more trees for all the environmental benefits trees offer.
Students from NHHS have been offering their help to this program for a number of years, making true to old adage, “many hands make light work.” It is also an opportunity for the young people to learn how to identify different plant species and how to care for them prior to planting.
Freymond Lumber supports the program by picking up the seedlings in Kemptville each year.
Customers order the seedlings through the BASC online store starting in January. This year, customers from across much of southern Ontario placed orders. Some are cottagers who are looking to add trees and shrubs to their properties. This year, both the shoreline bundle of three different types of dogwood and the new Algonquin bundle, consisting of sweet gale, cedar and red osier dogwood, were also very popular.
Chinese proverb – “The best time to plant a tree is twenty years ago. The second best time is now.”