First, I tipped the soil from the box onto a polytarp, mixed the bag of slow release fertiliser into the dry soil, dampened the soil. Then set to work filling the tubes.
Hoo boy. This is very time consuming. Not difficult, as such, just tedious. Took me nearly an hour to fill the first twelve tubes, but got the hang of it after a while, then filled the remaining 48 in an hour.
I poke the plastic pipe into the tube, make sure the bottom of the tube is fully open, then stuff the soil into the pipe with the broom handle: packing the soil firmly down the tube, while gradually bringing the pipe out.
Once all the tubes are filled, the seeding phase begins. This should really be completed by the weekend, as everything is carefully timed to match up with the collection of the seedlings by the planters in April/May next year.
More updates as they happen.
6 comments:
Onya Wom Batman!
God I love trees.
Whenever I see a handsome windbreak round a paddock I always feel sad that the plantsman could only have imagined what they would look like 80 years later.
My farmer friend got some kind of $$$ grant for planting 36000 trees - do you know about that one?
Keep packing those tubes!
I'm agreeing with you, Brownie - it's sad that the people who plant trees often can't get to appreciate them in their mature phase. Depends what sort of tree it is, of course, but yes, agreeing with you. It's a very forward-thinking and selfless action. There's a saying about hope, the future, children, and planting trees... which of course I can't remember now, but I'll come back if it springs to mind.
But the point is, Davo, good on you - it's an important thing you're doing, even if it IS tedious. Good luck with the seedlings.
Brownie, am not sure about $$$ grants. Trees for Life is a purely volunteer organisation, but there may be something available for landholders through "Landcare" .. will look it up.
Each TFL grower (nurseryperson?) grows for a specific purpose .. some for individual landholders, some for other projects. Mine are destined to go to the Onkaparinga Council as part of the "Million trees" project.
Deirdre, "good luck" is always preceded by "good management", but since am just learning the gritty details, "luck" may well be needed :).
Have you read The man who planted trees? It's a story written by Jean Giono (the Afterword down the bottom of that second link has info about him; the story is there too, but I think the version in the first link is better). You're probably too busy actually planting trees to read it, but it's worth a browse when the opportunity presents itself.
Still wracking my brain to find that saying about tree planting... Can't even remember where I saw it, let alone what the damn thing said. But it was probably Chinese, that much I'm nearly not confused about.
Anyway, good luck and good management to you and the gritty details.
Deirdre, those sort of "stories" have been around for quite some time. Johnny Appleseed is but another.
Good work.
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