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Trees!

Look at her! She’s beautiful!

Howdy all! As part of my Karma yoga practice, I’ve been looking for ways to do good while I’m walking in the woods for months. I spend a lot of time looking at trees, appreciating trees, cursing and squashing the billions of caterpillars that are eating the trees, and then I realized trees would be a very relevant fundraiser for a thru-hiker. I knew exactly who I wanted to help.

Contour Lines Corp

This past winter, Tommy with Contour Lines Corp came to HYA and donated hundreds of tree starts for the silvopasture we are developing. Using their techniques, we dug trenches along the contours of the pasture and planted trees along the downhill edge. When it rains, the water collects in the trenches and the trees receive plenty of water. Simple! Before I started my hike in April, I had the chance to check out the pasture and I was amazed at how well the trees were doing! Their method is certainly working.

Ayana triumphantly removing a tree from the nursery for planting in the pasture.

The pasture we planted this winter at HYA. Look at those contour lines!

Why They’re so Great

Check out their website at contourlines.org

They’ve got a great ‘Learn’ page that tells you everything about their work.

They’ve planted 2.2 million trees! They specifically help farmers to plant food forests, having assisted over 12,000 sites to date. Food forests are so valuable to the ecosystem and to farm production, you’ve gotta do some research on them if you don’t yet know. In addition, one of the most important things to me is that they offer support and training to these farmers to ensure the success of the food forests long after the initial planting. By starting with a simple tree planting technique, they introduce farmers to the whole array of sustainable agricultural methods which work together to make resilient and productive farms.

Fundraiser

Click the link above to donate! I hope I’ve convinced you. Your dollars will go far to help farmers and ecosystems around the continent. My fundraising goal is $2198 for the 2198 miles that I will be walking on the trail. Help me make every mile count!

So pretty! Plant some more beauties!

A Quick Trail Update

I got sick 🙁 might be heat exhaustion, but I got an especially nasty fever the last 2 nights. I am truly stealth camping in Kent, CT, as there is no place for a hiker to go (the inn is $170+ a night…). It really sucks. Hopefully I can recover fully soon and be on my way again. 

Also writing blog posts from a smartphone kinda sucks. Sorry I don’t post more, but it takes forever to type and format, and looking at my phone for so long gives me a headache. For more frequent updates of my journey, follow my instagram or facebook! Posting stories is so fast and easy I love it.

For now, toodles!

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