One Trillion Tree Partner Giveaways!

The City of Vancouver through its Urban Forestry Department has a list of 2023 fall landscaping trees available to residents. Don’t envy your neighbor’s tree, choose and plant the one you love! Click here to see the list, learn which one suits your lot best and order your tree! Choose from douglas fir, bigleaf maple, California black oak, ponderosa pine, incense cedar, green vase zelkova, presidential gold gingko, Princeton elm, bald cypress, yellowwood cladrastis kentukea and western red cedar.

Become an OTT Partner Individually or as an Organization!

We invite you to partner with us to foster tree planting in any way that you are able. Let us know where your interests are by contacting Elizabeth Madrigal at president@thegracecontinuum.org or giving her a call at (360) 857-6808. We will add your name to our One Trillion Trees Partners List!

Interested in a Tree Planting Event for Your Group or Organization?

We eagerly partner with families, private property owners, schools, clubs, community groups, foresters, nurseries, farmers, houses of faith, businesses, community groups, municipal services or any other organization that wants to plant trees. We are happy to customize a tree planting event that meets your vision. Options include club service projects, celebrations, memorials, and small or large events. For more information, please call or email: president@thegracecontinuum.org.

Upcoming Tree Planting Events

In Southwest Washington, many regional partners host numerous planting events throughout the year. Visit their websites at: Clark Public Utilities Stream Team, Watershed Alliance, Friends of Trees or Lower Columbia Estuary Partnership for dates and times for upcoming planting crews. Fall and spring are the usual planting seasons.

Trees assure life

A 2015 Yale-led study estimated there are 3.04 trillion trees living on Earth. It sounds like enough, but that is only 54% of the trees that were growing at the start of human civilization. The study estimated in 2015 that 422 trees existed per person. Our population was then 7.405 billion. By January of 2024, world population is expected to exceed 8.1 billion people. Thomas Crowther, now a professor of ecology at ETH Zürich and co-chair of the advisory board for the United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, lead the study as a Yale Climate & Energy Institute postdoctoral fellow at the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies (F&ES). At the time he told the Yale News, “Trees are among the most prominent and critical organisms on Earth, yet we are only recently beginning to comprehend their global extent and distribution.” Crowther’s study concluded that an estimated 15 billion trees are cut down each year by people but only 5 billion trees are replanted. If this net loss continues, Earth’s trees will all be extinct in about 300 years. Read more

Tree Equity as an aspect of Public Health

Although many think of trees as belonging in forests, trees are a incredibly critical part of urban infrastructure and essential to public health and well-being. Tree Equity Score was created to help address damaging environmental inequities by prioritizing human-centered investment in areas with the greatest need. According to its developer, American Forests, “Tree Equity Score measures how well the critical benefits of urban tree canopy are reaching those who need them most. The score establishes an equity-first standard to guide investment in communities living on low incomes, communities of color and all those disproportionately affected by extreme heat, pollution and other environmental hazards.” Determine your community’s tree equity score through this interactive application.

The Green Benefits of Planting Trees

If you are someone who needs to be “shown” the data, we are happy to make that case. Planting trees slows climate change and reduces our carbon footprint. A tree can sequester up to a ton of carbon dioxide over 40 years, because it can absorb up to 48 pounds of carbon dioxide per year. These carbon sponges also provide habitats for wildlife. With one million species at risk of becoming endangered by 2075, we have no time to waste in restoring our forest ecosystem. For more specific information on why all this matters, read more.

The oldest recorded living tree on record is a Great Bristlecone pine, believed to have a lifespan of over 5,000 years. Located in the White Mountains of California, this unnamed tree is considered the oldest living tree in the world. Read more

The Honorable Harvest

Our Indigenous Peoples were successful stewards of North American land, flora and fauna for thousands of years, and when the Europeans arrived, this piece of Turtle Island was ripe for western-style exploitation. Colonization threw off any ecological balance with practices that included deforestation, hoarding, over-fishing and tragic disregard for appropriate land conservation. Similar practices are underway on the other six continents as well. This quote is from Robin Wall Kimmerer [Potawatomi], a scientist, mother and author.

“Collectively, the Indigenous canon of principles and practices that govern the exchange of life for life is known as the Honorable Harvest. They are rules of sorts that govern our taking, shape our relationships with the natural world, and rein in our tendency to consume – that the world might be as rich for the seventh generation as it is for our own.” ~ Braiding Sweetgrass, The Honorable Harvest (p.180), 2013

Western science acknowledges the enormous value of Indigenous knowledge and the traditional practices in land and water management. If we are to heal, restore and protect Mother Earth, it is crucial that we change our mindset and employ strategies like the Honorable Harvest. In the simplest terms, it is the practice of assuring that this year’s harvest allows for next year’s by protecting the cycles of all living beings, including trees. Honorable harvesters do not take more than they need. Using this as a guide, it dishonors us to take a tree without planting a replacement. Indigenous wisdom clarifies that we are not meant to dominate Mother Earth, but to learn how to live in harmony with her.

Purpose and balance

Although written over 40 years ago, these words from the powerful social justice Activist, John Trudell (Santee Dakota), still ring true.

“The people who have created this system, and who perpetuate this system, are out of balance. They have come into our minds and they have come into our hearts and they’ve programmed us. Because we live in this society and it has put us out of balance, and because we are out of balance, we no longer have the power to deal with them. We are a natural part of the creation, we were put here on the sacred Mother Earth to serve a purpose. And somewhere in the history of people we’re forgetting what the purpose is. The purpose is to honor the Earth, to protect the Earth and to live in balance with the Earth. And we will never free ourselves until we address the issue of how to live in balance with the Earth. Because, I don’t care who it is, any child who turns on their mother is living a terrible, terrible confusion. The Earth is our Mother, we must take care of the Earth.”

Take the Planters Pledge!

Thankfully there are many organizations doing this work already, but it is going to take each and every one of us to take part at whatever level we can. Each tree planted represents an act of optimism. It also makes a commitment to future generations. Adding another trillion trees to the three trillion now growing on the planet is a game changer. Climate scientists estimate that one trillion trees can capture and sequester half the excess carbon humans produce. Our movement to plant a trillion trees is a simple call to action. By taking the Planters Pledge we commit to:

#1 Plant trees whenever, however, and wherever we can. #2 Plant two new trees for each one we remove. #3 Organize tree plantings and/or participate in tree plantings others organize. #4 Protect our living trees. #5 Celebrate occasions and pay tribute to others by planting a tree. #6 Encourage our families, friends and communities to plant trees.

This is a climate solution we know works. To be notified when there are upcoming local tree planting events, send an email to president@thegracecontinuum.org with the words, “Planters Pledge-Subscribe” or follow us on Facebook here

Need Help Planting Trees in Tribute or as National Reforestation?

Planting a tree to memorialize someone is one of the most meaningful ways our generation can pay tribute to their life, but why stop there? Celebrating the birth of a newborn, a new job, your parents’ 50th anniversary, retirement, a degree or simply a loving gift of gratitude to Mother Earth are all worthy occasions to plant a tree. Please contact our Executive Director, Elizabeth Madrigal, if you would like a referral to our memorial tree-planting partners. Please click here for a list of some of the locations our partners serve.

For information on planting trees and increasing pollinators on your property, here are some wonderful resources:

Our Mother will forgive us

The imbalance of our human existence and its impact on Mother Earth are visible everywhere. Frankly, the trees don’t need us to live. If we ignore how much we need them, our inaction will continue to cause immense human suffering. On a global basis, planting one trillion trees will cut our carbon problem in half. North America has the land, climate and water resources to be able to greatly contribute to this effort. Tree planting and climate restoration are critical to human existence and time is running out. It is up to us, the species responsible for such grave continuing harm, to make immediate amends to Mother Earth.

Climate Justice

Does Nature have rights? This White Paper was prepared by Sharm El Sheik (Egypt | November 2022) and submitted to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) COP27, “RIGHTS of NATURE, REDEFINING GLOBAL CLIMATE SOLUTIONS & ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION FOR SYSTEMIC CHANGE. Read the full report here.

Carbon Removal as a Stripe Climate Member

The Grace Continuum contributes 1% of all donations to Stripe Climate, a coalition of over 25,000 businesses in 39 countries accelerating carbon removal. No company can stop climate change by itself. Stripe Climate aggregates funds from forward-thinking businesses around the world to increase demand for carbon removal. Stripe Climate works with Frontier, Stripes in-house team of science and commercial experts, to purchase permanent carbon removal. Learn More.