Plant (Donate) a Tree… or Seven!
Happy Arbor Day!
Celebrating 150 years of a tree planting holiday.
The average American uses 7 trees per year. That equates to 2,328,444,251 trees used per year in the USA alone! The US population as I write this is 332,634,893. Are we doing our part to replenish what we use? One way to help would be to plant trees on any land you own. But what if you aren’t able to do that, consider donating to plant trees.
Places to Donate:
https://shop.arborday.org/forest-replanting-donation
https://www.releafmichigan.org/donate.html (for residents of Michigan)
https://www.americanforests.org/ways-to-give/plant-trees/
https://teamtrees.org/ (supported by some YouTube favorites, Mr. Beast and Mark Rober)
https://www.fs.usda.gov/working-with-us/donations
https://www.nationalforests.org/get-involved/tree-planting-programs
https://www.plantyourchange.com/
Remember to check all details before making a donation. This way you feel comfortable with your funding. For $1, you can effectively plant one tree. For $7 per year, you can offset your usage, that is achievable. But, why stop there?! How many people are you willing to offset their usage?
Bur oak we purchased from Abbott's in Ann Arbor and planted in 2018
Birch tree in Union Township, Michigan at the fork of the Boardman River
Trees are great! Go out and explore them, enjoy them, and support growing more of them.
Black and bur oak and sugar maple saplings planted in 2021
Other fun facts about tree:
Trees are the longest living organisms on Earth, and never die of old age
California holds the record for the oldest living trees. Some of the state’s bristlecone pines and giant sequoias are 4,000-5,000 years old. Methuselah, an estimated 4,852-year-old ancient Bristlecone Pine, is one of the oldest living trees in the world.
One mature tree will remove about 22 kilograms of carbon dioxide from the Earth’s atmosphere
That is only enough to offset burning 2.5 gallons of gasoline (plant more trees!)
Well-kept landscapes with trees increase property value
Several recent nationwide surveys show that mature trees in a well-landscaped yard can increase the value of a house by seven to 19 percent. A study by a Michigan State professor found that across seven different states, study participants perceived that home value increased from five to 11% for homes with a good landscape.
Before trees, Earth was home to fungi that grew 26 feet tall
Adding one tree to an open pasture can increase its bird biodiversity from almost zero species to as high as 80