On March 23, 2019, The Reserve hosted a free event at the Rimpa Estates Wildlife Conservancy called “Plant Trees, ❤️the 🌍”. The day was quite hot, and the grass was brown from the long dry season, but that didn’t stop our fabulous volunteers and sponsors from coming out to show their love for planet Earth. We were hopeful that the long rains would begin in April to help our newly planted trees grow.
Kenya has fairly low tree coverage, as low as 4% by some measures, and we see the need for more trees as a critical part in trying to reduce the onset of climate change. Here on our Wildlife Conservancy, trees play an important role in providing homes, food, and shade for our livestock and wildlife. And what made this event possible is the amazing product produced by Seedballs Kenya.
Their Seedballs make it so easy to distribute the seeds. By simply walking around and tossing the Seedballs onto the ground, the seeds remain there until the rains arrive and trigger their growth. So even though the weather was extremely hot and dry at the time of our event, the Seedballs would patiently wait for the rains to begin. We were given over 1000 seeds of indigenous acacia trees through the generous donations of Seedballs Kenya. We hope they have great success in the forest regeneration of Kenya!
Our event began with a tree planting ceremony, with short speeches made by Kevin and Rarin, the managers of The Reserve, and Hamilton Parseina (CECM land, physical planning & urban development, Kajiado county) who also sponsored the seedling to ensure its survival over the next few years. Our volunteers gathered around as we planted the seedling and watered it. The many children in attendance were especially eager to participate.
Once the tree was planted, we gave a bag of Seedballs to each of our volunteers, and they headed out across the Wildlife Conservancy. They enjoyed the quiet scenery of Rimpa Estates, with zebras and gazelles in the distance, as they tossed the Seedballs onto the ground. After spreading the Seedballs, our volunteers stayed around for the afternoon to have a picnic. We would also like to thank our generous sponsors for providing drinking water for our volunteers:
• OTA Adventures in East Africa
• Murphy Chemicals
• Masai Store Limited Silver Pumps.
We were quite pleased with the turnout of volunteers, and couldn’t be more grateful for their dedication on such a hot day. We look forward to hosting the event again next year.
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