The josephine county forestry department has been sponsoring a tree plant for the area youth since 1989 on ELK lane and stringer GAP road just outside of grants pass

The Bureau of Land Management awarded a $100,000 cooperative agreement to Josephine County, Oregon from March 1, 2022 to February 28, 2025 under the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination program. The county will use the funding to continue operating the annual Ross Roe Memorial Tree Plant, through which approximately 1,000 local youth in grades K-8 from 18 area schools and organizations plant seedlings on county-owned land. For over 30 years, the program has provided environmental education and hands-on forestry training to youth while reforesting parcels with mixed conifer species at an impressive 90% survival rate, reducing wildfire risk. The cooperative agreement will support ongoing seedling, equipment and volunteer costs to ensure the 32nd annual tree planting is successfully delivered to benefit both the local community and environment.

Each year approximately 1,000 kids ingrades kindergarten to 8TH grade from 18 area schools and youth organizations (e.g. BOY scouts, girl scouts, 4-h young marines) get an opportunity to plant tree seedlings of mixed species in a forest environment. Children are given instructions, assistance in planting along with discussion about the environment, tree identification, forestry, and good stewardship practices from foresters from the bureau of land management, oregon department of forestry, county extension service and josephine county. The children are provided with ponderosa pine, sugar pine, and douglas-fir tree seedlings, planting bags, kraft paper mulch to prevent vegetation in-growth directly around the seedlings, and vexar tubes to prevent browse from wildlife. The same parcel of land has been used for the youth tree plant the last 32 years. During the tree plant, local volunteers give children tractor rides throughout the parcel where they can see stand dynamics in action (how the planted stands of different ages have grown and changed overtime). The children are also encouraged to come back to the site on their own to show their family how their trees have grown, how the stand has changed over time, and witness good land stewardship inaction. Each child is given a metal tag and stake to permanently identify the trees they plant. The ross ROE memorial tree plant has an impressive 90% tree survival rating, and therefore has been extremely successful in RE-foresting the parcel and reducing the hazardous fuel loading for wildfire next to adjacent BLM lands.