CENTENNIAL TREE-PLANTING FOR SCHOOLS

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 4431, 29 August 1939, Page 5

CENTENNIAL TREE-PLANTING FOR SCHOOLS

PREPARATION’S IN MANY DISTRICTS. It is mentioned in ‘New Zealand Centennial News’ that the education authorities throughout the Dominion are making .a sn-eci-a-I effort to have available for planting jn 1940 large numbers- of native- shrubs and trees. ! - One object of the Centennial treeplanting scheme is to encourage the growth and cultivation of as many representatives as possible of the native flora as it existed in the school district a hundred yeans ago. In many cases some little research is- necessary, for often the earlier vegetation has been entirely destroyed and there is nothing left save in the memory of the oldest inhabitant, of the tangled forest that once covered the land.

It is hoped, therefore, that native trees and shrubs, herbs, and .grasses will be grown which are individually representative l of the slplo3j.es that existed on the school-site- at an earlier period. It cannot be hoped in most case® that the vegetation as a whole can be reproduced, far what was- destroyed in a night took Nature a millennium to establish. The aim has been to raise- the, cjTiick-growing specie-si in profusion, so that there will he shelter for the- -slower-growing and shade-loving .plants: in the area finally planted unon. In the majority of ca-e-si. no doubt, some corner of tire school-grounds will be set aside as a native abore-tum, and, if that is already done, more trees will be added to' it. In other case® it is known that the schools are co-operating with the Local authority and are growing the plants- that will be used to establish -a Centennial memorial area; in yet other cases the school is to plant -a piece of waste land, -a gully, or an -area an tho roadside which at present is hideously barren.