YLP with Azerbaijan Finalist Karthik Uppaluri Helps to Restore Desert Habitats at the McDowell Sonoran Conservancy for GYSD 2012

Karthik Uppaluri together with volunteers at the event

The Sonoran desert is truly a rich desert habitat in Scottsdale, Arizona with some of the species found nowhere else in the world. The preserve currently covers more than 18,000 acres and home to several rare species. It took thousands of years to build the geology of this preserve, and it’s easy to destroy it if we are not careful.  The efforts to sustain the preserve and help restoring it to its natural state will keep this living treasure for future generations to enjoy. Conservancy stewards, citizen volunteers, many high school and middle school students shared the same passion and joined together to restore the Conservancy on Global Youth Service Day weekend and Earth Day, April 21st 2012, by planting various kinds of Cactus and created new hiking trails.   Participants had perfect weather, with nice cool breezes under the morning sun. The Conservancy provided shovels, gloves, cactus plants and ropes etc. which were needed to plant 4 different kinds of cactus species.

Volunteers at the McDowell Sonoran Conservancy 

The enthusiasm was shared equally by 9 year old Gabby, to 89 year old Jane Rau who is the founder of the Conservancy.  Student groups ECO and APE took pleasure in restoring the habitat and joked around while working. Chaparral high school teacher Jen MacColl was proud of her students as they helped in restoring the habitat. She says it’s nice to be able to give the students an opportunity to give back to our society and make them realize the importance of natural habitats. Preserve manager Claire Miller, said that restoring the preserve is a grassroots citizen effort and it’s nice to see our youth getting involved. The Conservancy stewards who are the “head honchos” of the conservancy who take care of everything from education outreach to monitoring trails, were there to help with all the activities. Tony Siros, had 3 generations of his family members volunteering there. When asked why, he said they enjoy the preserve so much, that they want to help restore it.   Youth Leadership Program with Azerbaijan finalist Karthik Uppaluri from Arizona really enjoyed being part of restoring a living treasure, even though he fell on a cactus and spent some of his time at the project pulling out the thorns.

Note:
Karthik reached out to all of the Arizona finalists prior to Global Youth Service Day weekend to encourage them to join him and the volunteers of the McDowell Sonoran Conservancy for GYSD 2012.  

A thank you to Karthik Uppaluri for his blog submission!