stewardship

Planting native trees and shrubs on public lands has many long-term benefits, including increasing essential habitat for local wildlife. To ensure our efforts are successful, we’ll be monitoring the impact of our tree planting events on plant biodiversity over time. Thanks to support from Ontario Power Generation’s Regional Biodiversity Program, we can assess each site as it establishes itself and adaptively improve our future naturalization efforts when needed.

This fall, LEAF staff and volunteers have begun planting native trees and shrubs in York Region as part of a larger, three-year project to increase biodiversity on public lands in York and Durham Regions. Among project activities are planting 6,000 native trees and shrubs, monitoring sites before and after planting and engaging local community members. These activities are made possible in part, thanks to support from Ontario Power Generation’s Regional Biodiversity Program.