IndiaPost.com - BAPS volunteers participate in Earth Day tree-planting

CHINO HILLS, CA: In an effort to promote environmental awareness, the youth volunteers of BAPS Charities gave back to Mother Nature by participating in the Annual Earth Day festivities held on April 19.

The City of Chino Hills organized an Urban Forest Planting Project from 7:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. to plant over 100 trees on the north side of Grand Avenue, between Peyton Drive and Calle San Marcos. Over 30 participants with ages ranging from high school to college took part in this annual event, making them one of the largest groups present.

A total of 134 trees were planted. The group persisted till the end to help make plant-wells, carry topsoil, and manually water over half of the 134 trees. "You guys did an awesome job," said Mike Curtiss of Chino Hills, commenting on the volunteer's enthusiasm and eagerness to stay behind and help with the grunt work, "I wish I had another 40 trees for you to plant."

The youth volunteers of BAPS Charities, inspired by Pramukh Swami Maharaj, are devoted to spiritual and communal service for the betterment of humanity. Through weekly activities, the youth live well-balanced lives at home, school, work, and at the Mandir (temple).

These youths willingly refrain from the negative influences and actively participate in community activities. As a part of preserving the natural beauty in the city of Chino Hills and to give back to Mother Nature, the BAPS Cultural Center in Chino Hills, CA located just northeast of the 71 Freeway, set between Monte Vista and Central Avenues will be enhanced by planting over 25,000 plants and approximately 400 trees.

The facility will beautify the freeway corridor, creating new, open, public spaces with beautiful gardens, walkways, fountains and other landscaping. A variety of plants and trees will be planted on an ongoing basis on the 20-acre site. As part of the Earth Day celebrations, the first phase of planting began on April 22 with 220 trees.

The types of trees planted were Pine, California pepper, Cajeput, London plane, Sissoo and Magnolia grandiflora. This will be followed at a later phase with other 161 trees including several palm trees throughout the site.

In addition to the trees, 3,000 of the 15,729 large plant shrubs were planted and included varieties such as Newzland flax, Indian hawthorn, Heavenly bamboo, and Big blue lily adorning beautiful red, white and yellow shades. An additional 3,000 of the 5,826 smaller sized plants were added to the site.

This variety included such plants as Day lily and Fortnight lily in addition to the various ground cover and shrubs. BAPS Charities, the charitable arm that has managed and sustained over 160 humanitarian activities throughout the world in such diverse fields as: Medical Services, Educational Services, Environmental Services, Community Services, Tribal Services and Disaster Relief Services. Since 1995, as part of its environmental services, more than 1,200,000 trees have been planted throughout the world by volunteers of BAPS Charities.