Challenging start
The Spring Planting Season 2022 started on April 10. It is the 4th planting season of My Forest Armenia, and it appeared to be challenging from the beginning.This year winter lasted long, even too long, up to the end of March. Indeed, this was excellent for the seedlings planted in November. But on the other hand, it shortened our planting window in spring by almost two weeks.
Silver lining
However, everything has a silver lining. With the planting time shortened, we needed much more people to be able to plant 160.000 pine trees in 15 days. So we hired 120 people. As always, all our workers come from the communities of Lori Province. In most villages in Armenia, the unemployment rate is very high, and the communities of Lori are not an exception. So we are happy to have a social impact also in this region.
This year we are planting in two areas: Jrashen, and Dilijan National Park, and we are replanting in some parts of Shirakamut. We planted pines in Jrashen and oaks and pines in
. As for Shirakamut, we will replant in the place of trees that have died because of the last year’s disastrous drought․ Sadly, the latter has destroyed almost 60% of our plants. This season we are replacing all dead seedlings with pine trees. They have a double advantage: they are more resistant to dryness and proliferate, creating shade for deciduous trees.
Besides planting more resistant species, we took other measures as well. There is a canal running just below our reforestation area. So, last year we bought two powerful pumps and about 3.000 meters of tubing plus eight hoses of 50 meters to do watering. We hired eight workers for the summer months to continually water each plant.
Plant your forest
Our goal is to plant 400.000 trees or 120 ha of forests every year. It is our capacity at the moment. If we succeed, we will need 250 years to increase Armenia’s forest coverage by 1%! Did it shock you? Yes, these figures are shocking. We all need to double and even triple this 1%. You can join us by becoming a monthly donor and planting at least two trees a month. Let’s plant trees for life!