Potters Planting Trees

The Pawpaw, Asimina Triloba, is the largest edible wild fruit native to the USA. It occurs naturally in moist, shady places in most of the eastern half of the US. The tree develops a narrowly pyramidal shape with dense, drooping foliage down to the ground level, and seldom grows taller than 25 feet.  The pawpaw fruit is very nutritious, being high in vitamin C, magnesium, iron, copper, and manganese. They are also a good source of potassium, several essential amino acids, and they contain significant amounts of riboflavin, niacin, calcium, phosphorus, and zinc. Also knowns as the "poor man's banana", despite the similar spelling, the American pawpaw is not related to the tropical papaya. The pawpaw is a small, understory tree, unlikely to grow into the forest canopy, but it is also the most frequently observed sapling in forest monitoring plots that are tracked. This is most often attributed to the fact that deer find the pawpaw leaves unpalatable and so leav...

Let's talk about planting trees. You may have just come to hear about recent efforts by individuals, groups, and even entire countries planting trees to combat climate change and cut atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2). Last year, China began efforts to "increase the country's forest coverage from 21 percent of its total landmass to 23 per cent by 2020" ( Independent ), and deployed its army to plant trees. And just last month, Ethiopia led what is believed to be a world record in planting more than 353 billion trees in 12 hours, as part of "a wider reforestation campaign named 'Green Legacy'" ( CNN ).  According to a recent article in Discover Magazine , research estimates that atmospheric CO2 could be cut by 26 percent if forests are restored to their maximum potential. Research like this has led to earnest efforts in recent years to plant billions and trillions of trees, however that same article states that experts also warn that there's...