Establishing a tree nursery with the students of the schools in and around the Cocagne watershed is at the heart of the School Tree Nursery project. With the schools in Cocagne, Notre-Dame, Saint-Anne and Grande-Digue, we support a biodiversity conservation project by planting indigenous trees of the Acadian forest.
Indigenous tree species that you will find in our tree nurseries are :
- Red maple
- Red oak
- Yellow birch
- Balsam fir
- Black spruce
- White pine
Tree seedlings are provided by the New Brunswick Environmental Network through their Branch Out, Make Waves program.
After having lived in a nursery for one or two years, the trees will find their permanent home, either in the schoolyard or in the community. Once planted in permanent soil, trees will reduce the flow of surface water through root absorption, moderate shoreline erosion and increase wildlife habitat.
We addressed various topics in the schools to support the preparation of the tree nurseries, such as recognizing tree species of the Acadian forest, the importance of indigenous trees planted in buffer zones in relation to climate change adaptation, in addition to the considerations involved in establishing a tree nursery : the choice of the location/site, the preparation of the soil, the selection, procurement and maintenance of tree stock.
Acknowledgements
The PCSDG would like to thank the New Brunswick Wildlife Trust Fund, New Brunswick Environmental Network and the Collège communautaire du Nouveau-Brunswick for their support in this project.
