Students from the Bradford Area Christian Academy celebrated Earth Day and National Arbor Day this year by participating in the Seedlings for Schools program and the Pollinator Garden program, partnership programs of the Pennsylvania Game Commission’s Howard Nursery and the Wildlife for Everyone Foundation.
Since the Seedlings for Schools initiative began in 2008, 1.3 million seedlings were dispersed statewide to all counties of the Commonwealth. The Pollinator Garden just started in 2019.
Seedlings are grown and shipped from the Game Commission’s Howard Nursery located in Centre County. The Seedlings for Schools program allows students to experience their role as caretaker of their environment while having fun in the outdoor classroom. The program is available to all Pennsylvania schools with children enrolled from pre-kindergarten through 12th grade.
The Pennsylvania Game Commission provided enough seedlings for each student to take a silky dogwood seedling home to plant. New this year, the Pollinator Garden package contains a mix of 25 shrub and tree seedlings that are highly desired by native bees, butterflies and other beneficial insects.
BACA students will celebrate National Arbor Day this year by planting their silky dogwoods at home to create a home for birds and wildlife and will also celebrate Earth Day by using their pollinator garden seeds to start home pollinator gardens for butterflies, bees and other useful pollinators, including the monarch butterfly, which has experienced a 90% decline in the last two decades. The seed kits provided by the PA Game Commission through the Pheasants Forever program and the Quail Forever Program include 14 different species of pollinator plants including cone flowers, sunflowers and black-eyed susans.
