When we think back on the work we did in Columbia’s parks in 2024, a few events and moments offer themselves as striking examples that really need to be talked about before they are logged in the annals of our group’s history. Some of last year’s superlatives in 2024 included the hottest workday we have ever hosted (and not cancelled due to heat!). This took place in late July during a workday we scheduled in Columbia’s Garth Nature Area. Despite an early morning start to try and beat the heat of the day, Missouri Conservation Corps staff and volunteers worked in 95-degree heat 90% humidity, cutting large and thoroughly established invasive honeysuckle on the edge of a pond in this 52 acre public park on the north side of Columbia. This hot and humid workday wrests the title of “hottest” workday from the previous finalist for this title, an early July workday on the MKT Trail with members of Missouri River Relief and their summer campers in 2023. Below is a photo of the three brave volunteers who came out to work with us on the hottest workday ever for MCC…
The next superlative our volunteers encountered in 2024 was the largest honeysuckle ever cut down by a hand saw. This actually resulted in a tie that was too close to call, with a massive, multi-trunked honeysuckle plant in Garth Nature Area competing for the title against an enormous, 12 foot tall, old growth honeysuckle discovered on a forested hillside in Bonnie View Nature Sanctuary. You can take a look at the two contenders in the photos below, and decide for yourself which might be larger.
And finally, our coldest volunteer workday ever took place on a sunny Friday afternoon in late November. Volunteers from Missouri Conservation Corps collaborated with neighbors from the Ridgeway Neighborhood Association and with staff members from Volunteer Columbia to plant trees and install tree cages on the corner of Columbia’s Garth and Sexton Avenues. An air temperature of 30 degrees combined with a biting north wind to make hats, gloves, and winter coats an absolute necessity during this event, our first event ever held on the day after Thanksgiving, and definitely a “coats and gloves” event…
After two hours of planting and watering trees, and installing posts and cages for the new trees, our volunteers were treated to brownies, coffee, and hot cocoa in the cozy front room of Centro Latino. Our new trees on the corner will supplement an earlier tree planting implemented by the Columbia Tree Board and the Missouri Department of Conservation on this corner, and will help bring additional shade and cooling capacity to this neighborhood corner on our city’s north side.
After these striking examples of heat, cold, and overgrown invasive species, we can’t wait to get back out there with our volunteers in 2025!
