Touch the Earth Festival

earth-tree

Let’s celebrate Earth Day!
(one week later)

Join us for a FREE event on April 30 from 1 – 4 P.M. at the pavilion in Marilla Park, Morgantown, WV.

Co-hosted by:
West Virginia Land Trust
Mon Valley Greenspace Coalition
Mon River Trails Conservancy
Friends of Deckers Creek
Mountaineer Audubon
Morgantown Green Team
West Virginia Chapter of Sierra Club
WV Rivers Coalition
West Virginians for Public Lands
Avian Conservation Center of Appalachia

The Festival will feature fun educational activities, including a trail-building workshop in which participants will help complete work on Marilla Park’s signature trail. Other activities will include a guided tour of the park’s trails and small wetland, a tree-planting party, a crash course in invasive-species identification and removal, and a scavenger hunt in which participants will identify local flora. Trees on the trail route will have signage with information about their ecological and financial benefits, particularly as they relate to easing the adverse effects of climate change.

1:30 P.M. – Guided tour of trails and wetland
2:30 P.M. – Tree-planting
3:30 P.M. – Trail-building workshop

Food will be available for purchase from the Stray Cat Chimi Shack and Carolina BBQ by Smoke.

Guests who wish to participate in tree-planting, trail-building, and invasive species removal activities are encouraged to wear long pants, long-sleeved shirts, and gloves (so as to avoid contact with poison ivy) and bring shovels, if they have them. (Some shovels and other tools will be available for public use.)

One of the aims of the Touch the Earth Festival is to highlight the many benefits of a greenbelt around the city that links to the rail-trail in both the southern and northern neighborhoods, enabling residents to move around town without resorting to motorized transportation. Representatives from the MVGSC have been engaged for several years with the city to establish more connector trails, such as the one in Marilla Park, to link neighborhoods to city parks and the rail trail. The greenbelt would be the culmination of these efforts. More information and a map will be on display.

The festival will occur rain or shine.

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