On Saturday 24th July 2021 the Aotea Electric Canterbury team came out with their families to help plant trees with Trees For Canterbury. As proud sponsors of this worthy charity, the Aotea team rolled up their sleeves and joined other volunteers to spend a couple of hours planting at Halswell Quarry. We also offered to fire up the BBQ and feed all the volunteers as a small thank you for giving up their time.
Trees for Canterbury is a not-for-profit Community organisation on a mission to plant two million native trees across Canterbury. They hold several Community Planting Events a year, where the charity coordinates and helps volunteers. It’s a chance to get hundreds of native plants in the ground, increasing biodiversity, regenerating the landscape, and providing future homes to the birds and insects, which are struggling.
Steve Bush gets stuck into the planting.
Tree planting ‘has mind-blowing potential’ to tackle the climate crisis. Planting billions of trees across the world is one of the biggest and cheapest ways of taking CO2 out of the atmosphere to address the climate crisis, according to scientists.
As trees grow, they absorb and store the carbon dioxide emissions that are driving global heating. New research estimates that a worldwide planting programme could remove two-thirds of all the emissions from human activities that remain in the atmosphere today, a figure the scientists describe as ‘mind-blowing’.
“It is available now, it is the cheapest solution possible and every one of us can get involved.” – Prof Tom Crowther. Source: The Guardian.
Steve Bush runs the day to day management of the charity and his commitment has assisted Trees for Canterbury to continue to focus on its aims to:
- Employ
- Educate
- Regenerate
The sun was shining across Christchurch as the early-bird Aotea team arrived to set up the barbeque ready for the sausage sizzle. Hired from the council, the impressive barbie grill was set up in the sunshine, just beyond the far Quarry car park. Armed with several huge bags of sausages the ‘big onion chop and bread buttering’ began.
At 10 am the volunteers began arriving, some bringing their own spades, wearing good footwear and gardening gloves. After signing in everyone headed to a steep bank where local rangers had prepared for the tree planting. Tree guards, stakes, wool mats, and the new trees and plants were spaced across the bank ready to be planted.
The beautiful winter weather was perfect for the planting day.
Why bother with a tree guard? The EMGuard™ made in NZ, using a majority of recycled pulp, is specifically designed to cope with tough conditions. The tree guards have been shown to greatly improve the chances of survival and promote the growth of young plants. They assist in reducing ongoing maintenance time and costs, protect plants from predators, and even help reduce water loss and provide a micro-climate favourable to growth. They are particularly good in the first year of planting.
The guard doesn’t need to be removed once the plant is established, as it naturally breaks down. If by chance the EmGuard™ washes into a waterway it will naturally biodegrade over time, causing no harm to our waterways.
Our eye-catching tree guard labels can be found on new trees planted throughout Canterbury.
We provided some eye-catching tree guard labels to help secure the guards into place. Again, these are completely biodegradable. Look out for the bright green Aotea Electric Canterbury labels when you come across new trees in the region.
Over 100 volunteers turned up to get the job done, including Aotea team members with their children. Steve Bush and Robbie Venrooy, Director at Aotea, led the way with their spades. We filmed the planting action via drone and got lots of great action photos.
The hills at Halswell Quarry were alive with volunteers.
The sausage sizzle was well-earned and enjoyed by everyone. It was a chance for Steve to thank everyone and explain how Trees for Canterbury helps across the community. There were smiles all-round for a good morning’s work helping protect and renew beautiful Canterbury.
Volunteers queued for a well-earned saussie at the BBQ.
You can also get involved or offer your support:
>> Community Planting Days
>> Donate Trees