It was pouring rain, but nobody seemed to mind – except a photographer who was trying to keep his camera dry.
About a dozen volunteers from the Build Lebanon Trails group and the Lebanon Garden Club, along with 21 volunteers from Weyerhaeuser’s Snow Peak and Alsea offices, gathered at the Marks Slough trailhead off Tennessee Road on the outskirts of Lebanon Thursday morning, March 12, to plant some trees – a lot of trees.
Thirty-six, to be exact, all of them paid for by a grant of $25,000 by Weyerhaeuser through American Forests, an organization that promotes the planting of trees all over the country.
Following a brief welcome from Lebanon Mayor Ken Jackola and some opening remarks from Allison O’Sullivan, community assistance forester for the Oregon Department of Forestry, and others, they marched off to get busy.
O’Sullivan provided volunteers with instruction on how to loosen up pot-bound root balls and how to plant the trees at proper heights.
“It was wonderful to have Allison,” said Linda Ziedrich, a Lebanon Garden Club member who volunteers with BLT and was an organizer for the event. “I learned a lot from her and I think other people did too. I think we will plant trees better in the future because of that.”
City staff had dug holes for the trees along the trail, which loops around open fields to the east of some clumps of more mature trees, west of the South Santiam River behind the Lebanon Waste Water Treatment plant.
The newly planted trees, most of which were close to 10 feet tall, included various oaks and maples, some elms, lindens, ginkos, some Village Green zelkovas, yellowoods and maple-like London plane trees. They were also staked and mulched over the course of about three hours the volunteers were there.
Ziedrich said organizers chose larger trees, most in 15-gallon pots, to give them a better chance of survival. She said the trees were chosen for drought and heat tolerance and “general toughness,” as well as fall color.
She said organizers were unable to procure native species from the nursery they got the trees from, so they went with the species selected.
She said more planting efforts may take place later in the year, at other parks.
Despite the conditions – blowing wind and pounding rain, “it was great,” she said of the effort.
“I was so impressed with the volunteers from Weyerhaeuser. They put up with horrible weather and they were happy and worked hard. They were wonderful to have.”
