National Tree Day at Bodhi Farm in Tassie

Sunday 27th July 2008
( I have discovered by the way that if you double click on any photo on this blog you will be able to look at it on a larger scale)

Yes it is National Tree Day again and with our usual tradition we aimed to plant as many trees as possible for the day.

With a great deal of preparation and organization in the few weeks before we were certain that it would all pay off for us.

I worked out what plants we wanted to plant and where and set about trying to find a supplier of trees as we had got quite busy in Oct/Nov of last year when we were suppose to start propogating and planning so this year we would have to buy some in. This proved to be a little difficult as we were still trying to work out who supplies what and to where. Finally I found a place in Launceston that supplies trees in Hiko trays (which are plugs, which are quite small trees) but the smaller they are the better and stronger they grow in the end. They were able to supply the trees for around 70 cents which is quite cheap. I organized and ordered about 850 trees and this was only to fill one side of our wildlife corridor on the block, and even then we would still need understorey and shrubs.

With a detailed plan of the block in one hand and a day after I ordered them the trees arrive and we were pretty much ready for the day. Food was organised for the anticipated volunteers that would arrive and suitable work wear was also needed. After inviting all the people that we knew over here we ended having about 14 people altogether come and enjoy the day which we thought was fantastic considering that we have only been in Tassie since October.

Jamahl borrowed a petrol auger from work and worked out from the plan where the trees were going. We measured out some stakes at the precise points as to where the different species of trees were going to go and started laying out tree guards, stakes, water, soil and plants.

First to arrive was Miranda and Monte, they set to work planting and Monte was put to work putting soil in the holes that Jamahl had drilled, ready for the plants to go in. I was to come up behind them and put the tree guards on around the plants and Jamahl was going to drill some more holes for the plants. We had a fantastic system going and were going really well. I needed to start using the new tree guards that we had bought that came on a roll and soon discovered that the shop had given us the wrong ones......spewing. That was ok, we decided that we would just plant the trees that had tree guards supplied and leave it at that as we could not risk the plants being eaten by the wildlife in the area.

All in all we had the most fantastic day and planted about 200 trees, we now have a sea of tree guards, and those of you who saw our efforts at Murray Bridge in Adelaide you will appreciate the same effort that we had put in on Sunday. It will look amazing and serve many purposes when it all starts growing. The best thing about this block compared to Murray Bridge is that we only have to water the trees in when we plant them and put a tree guard on and walk away, no irrigation, no mulch and no compost is needed for this lot, what a relief. We could not have asked for a better day weather wise, we had sun even though it was a little chilly we did not mind in the slightest.

The kids also had a ball as there were six of them altogether and they all had fun either climbing on our mountain of straw bales that now take up our whole shed, or the enormous dirt mound, or the playground. They were in their element.

In the late afternoon we then headed over to Monte and Rebecca's house for Matty's 2nd bday party, so we had another big day.

A huge thank you to everyone that came along and helped us out for the day, it is really great to see the community spirit that everyone has over here and there is always someone or people willing to help and lend a hand. We enjoyed the day and look forward to helping you all plant your share at any stage.