Municipal forest of Wegscheid, Alsace, France, April 2022
In the municipal forest of Wegscheid (Grand Est region of France), certain plots are mainly planted with stands of fir and spruce trees. Since 2018, these species have been suffering from drought and successive attacks by bark beetles. The aim of the project is to replace the diseased spruce trees in Wegscheid forest with a diversity of species more resilient to climate change.
This project has an important educational component through the involvement of pupils from local schools. Moreover, it is twinned with a mangrove plantation project in Madagascar. Over two years, the French pupils will participate, in parallel with those in Madagascar, in planting 4,260 perennial trees in Wegscheid and 7,200 mangroves in Madagascar.
A Tree for You has partnered with the ONF (French Office National des Fôrêts) for the technical part of the plantations and with Kinomé and its Forest&Life programme for the educational dimension.
The project started in 2021 in the Haut-Rhin department, on plot n°10 in Wegscheid municipal forest. Plot n°10, previously a privately owned spruce plantation, was purchased by the municipality in 2016. Since 2018, the fir and spruce stands on this plot have been suffering from dieback due to drought, as well as repeated attacks by bark beetles. So the plot has been logged and now needs to be replanted to ensure regeneration and adaptation to climate change. Preparations for the soil and planting began in autumn 2021 with technicians from the ONF.
The educational part of the project with pupils from the surrounding schools started in September 2021. Scheduled to run throughout the whole school year in France, the project is divided into four periods and four educational activities:
On Thursday 13 and Friday 14 January 2022, in the Haut-Rhin department, the Forest&Life team went to meet the teachers and pupils from the classes taking part in the programme. Thanks to this intervention, the children gained awareness of the importance of trees and the forest and discovered the project they are involved in, together with its counterpart in Madagascar, the country twinned with their school.
Planting with the pupils was originally planned to take place after the intervention. Unfortunately it had to be postponed to February due to snow and sub-zero temperatures.
On Thursday 24 and Friday 25 February 2022, pupils and teachers were able to get actively involved during two planting days.
Over these two days, nearly 175 pupils from the schools of Rimbach, Oberbruck, Kirchberg, Masevaux, Sewen and Dolleren came to plant 1,366 trees out of the 2,000 planned for Wegscheid municipal forest!
The students planted Douglas fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii), European larch (Larix decidua) and Corsican pine (Pinus laricio var corsicana).
The other species planned for the project, the sessile oak (Quercus petraea), the small-leaved lime (Tilia cordata), the field maple (Acer campestre), the wild pear tree (Pyrus communis), the wild apple tree (Malus sylvestris) the more sensitive white elm (Sorbus aria), chestnut (Castanea sativa), cedar (Cedrus), liquidambar and ginkgo will be planted by the technicians of the ONF (Office National des Forêts) to ensure their good growth.
The children were eager and delighted to participate in these half-day planting sessions with their teachers and accompanying parents. They were introduced to tree planting by Michel Farny, ONF referent, and his team, who accompanied them on during these two planting days. “I loved planting trees,” ; “Can we come back tomorrow?”; “Planting trees is important for better air and for animals.”
In the words of Raphaël Schellenberger, Member of Parliament for the Haut-Rhin region, who attended the morning launch on Thursday 24 April, “this is great educational operation for our children because today they are learning about and taking care of their forest for tomorrow.”
The pupils were rewarded with a hot chocolate offered by the Mayor of Wegscheid, Jean-Marie Berlinger, and a planting certificate.
The Mayor organised a citizens’ campaign to plant the remaining 634 seedlings of first wave of planting. Some 20 volunteers from the commune came to lend a hand on the morning of Saturday 26 February.
The pupils and their teachers are continuing to discover forests in class, thanks to the Canopée programme, as well as doing creative work on to send to their Madagascan counterparts.
In Madagascar, activities have also started and pupils participated in planting the first mangrove trees (more information here).
The same actions with different classes and pupils will be carried out next year and enable the planting of 2,000 new trees.
The rest of the trees will be planted by the ONF technical teams in order to hit the final target of 4,260 perennial trees for this project.
