A local group is doing what it can to raise awareness about native plants and increase Chatham-Kent’s tree cover at the same time.
Mike Smith is the founder of ReLeafCK, and is asking area residents to be on the lookout for young native trees this spring in preparation for the inaugural TreeCycle event in North Buxton this September.
“Essentially everybody’s probably mowed them over in their grass, so we’re going to save those trees, dig them up, put them in pots, and take care of them for a few months, and then they can be delivered to the Tree Depot, which will be taking place at the Buxton Pavilion September 11th and 12th.”
The group will have volunteers on hand in September to help identify trees and make sure they’re native species.
“We want the good stuff, we want to take those local genetics for trees that are very important. Obviously the closer you plant a tree to where it grew up, its’ going to be more well adapted to that area, so the closer we can obtain seedlings and small tree stock for our tree planting projects in Chatham-Kent, the better.”
Smith says native plants support pollinators, up to 450 kinds of caterpillars and other insects, more-so than trees and plants that have been imported from other areas.
Participants can swap out their saplings and take as many trees as they’ve dropped off, or donate the plants to ReLeafCK to be used in future tree planting projects across Chatham-Kent.