News.bytes Extra, issue 384

Trails Day Event involves 100 school children

About 100 elementary school children from Pines and Cedarwood elementary schools in Magalia learned about their environment and worked on a community service project during the annual Trails Days event at the BLM Upper Ridge Nature Preserve in Butte County during mid May. (text continues below)

Supervised by members of the CCC, students take turn using a hand saw to cut logs that will later be split into firewood and delivered to area families.

The BLM's Redding Field Office partners with Upper Ridge Wilderness Areas, Inc, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, California Conservation Corps (CCC), Magalia Beautification Association, the Butte County Fire Safe Council and Paradise Unified School District for the annual event.

The Trail Days event, winner of the 1998 President's Environmental Youth Award (Environmental Protection Agency), provides fifth graders with training in fire prevention and fire protection and offers them hands-on environmental education and nature study.  The students work on maintenance projects  and help cut firewood that is  provided yearly to families in need.

Below, students arriving at the project site are greeted by a banner with the partner agencies' names.

Below, students head to the woods to work on a maintenance project.

Students also visited a tree nursery to learn the correct way to plant trees, learned about firefighting, and were told about what to do if they ever become lost in the woods.   They also learned about defensible space and how to safely use tools to create fire breaks.

The Upper Ridge Nature Preserve is a 120-act tract of public land managed by Upper Ridge Wilderness Areas, Inc. under a cooperative agreement with the BLM.

- Jeff Fontana, BLM Northern California District 
- Photos  by Bill Kuntz, outdoor recreation planner, BLM Redding Field Office

BLM-California News.bytes, issue 384