Happy Earth Day! The theme of Earth Day 2021 is "Restore the Earth" and a small way in which you can make a BIG impact is to help maintain the trails at your favorite wooded hiking spots. With the help from some of our Homeschool Naturalist students and Nature Educator Carl, you can learn how you can help --and it's as simple as moving some sticks and leaves and can be done in just a few minutes!!
What happens is that if a patch of a hiking trail is muddy or flooded, especially during the Spring, people tend to create alternate paths along the trail--destroying and disturbing important flora and fauna. In addition, water, which takes the path of least resistance will then run down these newly created paths, further exposing and weakening tree root systems causing them to fall. By creating a deterrent to these newly created shortcuts using large sticks and branches, and disguising the head of the path with leaves, you can help to restore the earth by maintaining the trails whenever they're in need of a little Earth Day magic!