Srini's blog: Green Day - Sapling Plantation Event by Cuddalore Team of Chennai Trekking Club

We a group of nature loving people under the tag "CTC Cuddalore" organised Green Day on 4 September 2016.

This initiative is part of Chennai Trekking Club's Ainthinai's efforts to create more spread of green on our Mother Earth.

We planted tree saplings inside the premises of St. Joseph's School, Manjakuppam,
Cuddalore.

Mr.Sairam is a retired forest dept official;

He provided us saplings for this plantation drive. He has been developing tree saplings and providing them to people who are into planting sapling as a social activity. He provided 60+ tree saplings for free. It was a great support for us.

Before organising this, we invited people who are new to the fold of CTC, but are already experienced in nature activities. We got some vital inputs from them. Firstly they guided us to Mr.Sairam; secondly they advise us to do the digging of pits the previous day itself, thirdly it should be in a gated premises to avoid damage due to cattle.

The students of the St. Joseph's school had already dug the required pits in the designated place. It was a great help for us. Usually digging of pits for tree plantation takes up a hell lot of time. But since it was done the previous day itself, the tree plantation day was a cake walk. Nearly 50 saplings were planted within one hour.

While everyone removed the plastic bags and planted the saplings into the pits, one person (yours truly ofcourse) segregated away the plastic bags to avoid plastic debris polluting the places nearby. But there were sufficient plastic garbage found strewn around and we removed a total of 2 KGS of plastic garbage from the vicinity.

After the plantation work was over, Mr.Sairam gave an expert talk to us on his knowledge.

Some points shared by him are as follows...

In ancient times, deforestation is less and trees were more in numbers. Now more of people have lessened the space available for trees to grow. So it's important for us to plant and develop trees. It's like tending an infant to grow up.

Many animals inside forests are not getting enough food / fodder and are coming out into human habitation. People are now realising it and opine that blunders are being done by humans.

Tips for good saplings...

Sow the seeds, examine the sprouts which come out healthily. Select them for sapling plantation

Pit size should be larger, like 1.5 Cubic feet for our place/town - Cuddalore.

If done in rocky area, go for 3 cubic feet pit or 1 cubic metre pit.

Have farm yard manure/ fertilizer inside the pit for the sapling to get healthy and grow stronger.

Have red soil if you can get it.

The importance of taking deep pits is for trees to help their roots to go deeper and help them grow faster

The first important thing is that main root should go deeper and earlier. So make the pits as deeper as possible.

Sapling (seedlings) should be of 3 or 4 feet or more height while we sow. This helps in the plant being tolerant to its new place of living and lessens probability to cattle attack.

Sapling with the soil should be handled with care, like an infant. Do not allow shock. That will kill the plant.

Do not water abundantly. That will kill the plant. Better to have wet as well as dry condition.Water it only if you find the tree is showing unhealthy symptoms due to want of water.Watering to be done only when needed. Excess watering is a kill.

Protection of plants is a necessity. Many types of tree guards are available. Just three poles and a chicken mesh is a simple and cost effective protection for a baby tree.

There is a misconception that roots of trees will damage adjacent building. This is not true for most instances. We are having modern system for construction. Piling type of construction methods are there. These methods are insulated against any damages due to tree roots.

Three poisonous species tree are
Veli Karuvel maram
Parthenium
Neyveli Kattamanei

We had a great experience in gaining knowledge from him....